Flames and Twilight
by TheFaithless
Summary: 3 years after Riku and Sora returned to Destiny Island after KH2, Riku finds himself wishing for adventure once more.
1. Part 1: Wanting More

"Do you ever miss it, Sora?" Riku asked. Sora and Riku were sitting on the pier at Destiny Islands, looking out at the sea, enjoying the sunset on a warm summer evening.

Sora gave Riku a slightly confused look. "Miss what?"

Riku shrugged, and waved off Sora's question. "Nothing, just thinking out loud. Whatta want to do for dinner?" Sora was undeterred however, and pressed Riku further.

"It wasn't 'nothing,' you had that faraway look in your eye again, and I know that if anything, it means _something_. So just tell me, I'll answer, and then we can go grab Kairi and cook some food over a fire on the beach." Riku shook his head and gave a little smile at Sora's straightforwardness.

"Do you miss swooping in to save the day, fighting off Heartless and Nobodies like you were born to it?" Riku sighed, then turned to Sora and looked him in the eye. "Do you ever miss the thrill of the fight? Of being a hero? We've been sitting here living out a peaceful life here on Destiny Islands for the last three years, without any fights to be fought, just relaxing. Like we did before we left the first time."

Sora continued to stare at Riku for a moment, then turned out to face the sea again. It was a few minutes before he answered. "I dunno. I never truly got a thrill out of fighting, even though I did enjoy it sometimes. I fought because I had to, for my friends. As for being the hero. . ." he thought in silence for a moment, then "maybe a little. But it's not important anymore; I have a different life now. I have Kairi, and there are no armies of Heartless or Nobodies or Organization to fight off here in our home." He nodded to himself then, seemingly satisfied with his own answer. "What about you? Do you miss being a hero?"

"I was never the hero. . ." Riku whispered under his breath, just soft enough so that Sora didn't hear him.

"Say what?" Sora asked.

"No. I don't miss it; I feel the same way you do." Riku lied smoothly, plastering a confident smile across his face. "Why don't you go grab Kairi then? I'll go grab some wood from the stash and get the fire started while you and her pick up the food from your house so we can all eat."

"Alright, sounds good. I'll be back with Kairi and food then, see ya in a bit!" Sora waved as he ran off to the other end of the island, where the little houses that they called home were.

Riku waved back with his false smile, and waited till Sora had turned around a cliff before removing it. He turned back to face the sea, lost in the past.

_Why couldn't I tell Sora that I missed it? That without an enemy to fight, I feel lost and without a purpose? _Riku wondered, staring at the sea. _And asking me if I missed being a hero? I was never the __**hero**__- it was always Sora. I was just a someone who happened to be there. Nothing more to all the people we saved._

Riku wouldn't admit it to Sora, but he was jealous. But more than that, Riku missed fighting. He was a creature of action. He wanted to fight. He wanted a purpose other than sitting on his idyllic island, watching the years go by.

He wanted something more.


	2. Part 2: Rebirth

He just drifted.

Floating in some odd, "in between" that he couldn't quite place.

Not aware of his surroundings, almost asleep- like a dream?

But he was at peace, without a care.

"_**Do you remember how you came to be here?"**_A deep voice asked. It spoke very slowly, very deliberately, very powerfully.

His eyes snapped open. "What? Who is that?" He looked around and noticed that all around him was just white. "And where am I for that manner?"

"_**Aren't you are neither here nor there? You are a Nobody, were you not?" **_It asked, seeming smug.

"I know I'm a Nobody!" he yelled angrily. "Or at least I was. . . and no word games, if you don't mind."

"_**If you wish. . . you were a Nobody in being, yes, but not a Nobody in essence. It is not common knowledge, but it is entirely possible for a Nobody to reclaim their heart. Which you did."**_

He was stunned. "I . . . had a heart? But how?" But then he thought about it, and he realized that though he was a Nobody and convinced he didn't have a heart, he had felt. Or at least thought he had. "Why couldn't I see this?"

"_**After not having a heart for so long, you had forgotten how it felt. Like an open wound that seals over, the surface is devoid of sensation, but under the surface you still feel. You are a Nobody no longer. As for how . . . that is a question for another time."**_

"What? Another time? I'm dead! I've got all the time in the . . . wherever we are. I don't suppose 'world' would exactly be the right term for it." He said with a sigh. But to his surprise, the voice only chuckled.

"_**Dead? Not yet . . . you are not done yet. You will not remember your life as a Nobody, or the life before. You will be remade, into someone new."**_

"What! No! You can't do this to me! I'm finally at peace! I won't let-" Then the bright light disappeared and was replaced with a crushing darkness. Then bright light returned, but this time it was sunlight.

"Hello?" a woman's voice asked. "Hey are you alright?" He woke up and looked up, blinking through the harsh sunlight. Standing bent over him was a lady with a black headband and a small, black outfit with tall boots. He sat up and shook his head.

"I'm alright, I was just taking a nap. Sorry to worry you." He smiled up at her and held out his hand. "What's your name?"

She took his hand and shook it, and pulled him up to his feet. "I'm Yuffie." She looked him up and down as he stood straight, noticing his black slacks, white sneakers, and his long sleeved bright yellow (half-way unbuttoned, she noticed!) shirt . She raised an eyebrow and smiled, "And I wouldn't mind getting your name either!"

He smiled. "The name's Axel. Got it memorized?"


	3. Part 3: Unexpected Guest

Riku was lying on the beach, watching Kairi and Sora have their splash fight in the water. He let the lovers have their fun while he tended the fire, thinking of old memories while he cooked. When he judged that Kairi and Sora were far enough away they wouldn't notice, he held his hand up and with a thought, watched the blue and black flames come to life and dance in his palm.

"Why can I control you again?" he asked himself out loud. A few months previous he had accidentally discovered in his sleep that he was beginning to be able to wield the powers of darkness again, and was worried at what this meant. He wasn't in darkness anymore, King Mickey had said. Though once he wielded dark powers, and even some light later on, he gave all that up. Was the darkness he couldn't control in his heart coming back? He dismissed the thought, along with the flames, for now.

"Riku! Are you done cooking?" Kairi asked as her and Sora walked out of the water and up to the fire to dry off. They were completely soaked, having pushed each other under the surface of the calm sea more than once.

Relieved that he came out of day dreaming and that he dismissed the flames when he did, Riku replied "Yeah just finished, I'll dish it out."

Kairi moaned with the warmth of the bowl Riku handed her and thanked him. He handed Sora his, to which Sora responded with "This smells great! I still can't believe you learned to cook this well over those years you were running around with Ansem."

"Well, Ansem wasn't much of a cook, so in my travels I started to pick some things up here and there." Riku said with a chuckle.

After their initial conversation and small talk the trio went quiet and just enjoyed the food and stars above, and the peacefulness. All of a sudden though, Sora shot to his feet and summoned his keyblade. Seeing Sora do this, Riku followed suit, even though he hadn't seen anything.

"What is it Sora?" Kairi asked, crouched on the ground ready to get behind the two veteran warriors when the fighting started. Though she learned to fight, she was nowhere near as powerful as them.

Sora's eye's scanned the sky, "I saw something large blot out some stars then keep moving." He looked around some more. "It looked like it was coming this way."

All of a sudden there was a loud crash in the water on the shore near them, and a dark shaped loomed out of the water. Riku, whose eyes were gifted with better eyesight in the dark because of his darker powers, recognized the shape at once.

"It's King Mickey's Gummi Ship." He said as he dispelled his keyblade, and Sora followed suit. Riku was right, and when the hatch opened a familiar shaped climbed out to greet them.

"Hey guys!" He said in his typical cheerfulness. "Sorry to alarm you guys, I had my systems on low so I wouldn't wake anyone in their homes as I landed."

"It's all good sir!" Sora said after shaking his hand. "Are Donald and Goofy with you?" He asked hopefully, looking behind Mickey to the Gummi Ship.

"I'm afraid not, they're out on a mission for me. I'll be sure to let them know to stop by when they get back though; I know it's been a few years." Mickey said.

"Would you like some dinner King Mickey?" Kairi asked.

"Oh no thank you, I'm good. It would be nice to catch up with you all though, do you know where I can stay until morning? Then we can catch up."

Sora volunteered his place, and so everyone went their separate ways until they would meet the next morning. Riku, knowing the King the longest and being his good friend, noticed that the King was slightly nervous about something. Riku figured he find out in the morning tough, and just went home.


	4. Part 4: New Friends, New Beginning

"So Axel, where ya from?" Yuffie asked while they were walking back towards the more inhabited areas of Radiant Garden, where everyone lived.

Axel shrugged, "Here and there, I travel a lot." Truth was though, he didn't entirely remember himself, which he thought was curious. He just remembered flashes of different place he thought he'd been to. _But better keep that to myself, I don't want to make the only person I know think I'm a loon._

"Ooh. What were you doing out in the middle of the park?"

"I was just enjoyin the sunlight, as you can see I'm a bit pale." He chuckled.

Yuffie laughed with him while skipping and dancing along, forgoing walking for more entertaining traveling methods. "Where're you staying? We haven't had anyone move in a while, and staying in our hotels requires a lot of munny nowadays. . ."

"You don't think I'm wealthy?" Axel gasped in mock surprise.

"Well, you could be, but wealthy people tend to be meanies! And you're not." She added with a giggle.

"Well since you bring it up then, I actually don't have a place to stay, I kinda just got here." Axel admitted while looking around.

Yuffie leaped up and down excitedly, "Oh oh oh you can come stay with me and my friends then! We help keep the town safe and stuff, we're kinda like the government I suppose. Or the police force. Whatever. But yeah we have plenty of open rooms at our headquarters!"

"Wow, thanks! I'd be a fool not to accept. Shall we?" He held his arm out as if asking for for a dance.

She blushed at the gesture, then took his arm. "Of course!"

A few hours later Axel and Yuffie arrived back at headquarters, to find Squall and Cid engaged in a verbal sparring match about proper encoding of the updated city defense grid.

"No look here at this line, the algorithm you put in would have the system attack some of the citizens that are the same size as the Dusk Nobodies." Squall said while pointing to one of the thousands of lines of coding on the screen."

Cid jabbed a finger at a point in the coding further down yelling, "But I cancelled it out with this one here, which takes into account subject composition and mass, which it cross indexes with our database to determine if it's a threat to the city."

"You know, it would be much simpler if you guys just listened to me and hired a guard or two ya know," Yuffie interrupted. "and we have a guest, so don't be rude, and come introduce yourselves."

Squall and Cid both shot Yuffie exasperated looks, but then turned and allowed Yuffie to do the introductions. "Squall, Cid, this is Axel; Axel, Squall and Cid."

"Pleasure to meet you." Axel said, shaking hands with each in turn.

"He'll be staying with us for a bit, is that alright with you guys?" Yuffie asked.

"What, he your boyfriend?" Cid teased.

"No, we just met!" Yuffie replied, blushing furiously and getting defensive.

"Well whatever the case, feel free to help yourself to anything you need, just be sure you help out in return." Squall laughed as they left to go back to coding.

Axel laughed too, but stopped when he turned to look at Yuffie to notice she was still blushing and holding her hands over her face. "Hey what's wrong Yuffie?"

"I can't believe they called you my boyfriend! We barely know each other! Sheesh."

Axel smiled. "Well let's remedy that, shall we? Know any good places we can go to dinner tonight? If you aren't busy, of course." He added as an afterthought.

Yuffie blushed even harder than earlier, but finally managed to say quietly "Yeah there's a good restaurant down the street."

"Well it's a plan then! Looking forward to it" he said with a smile. Yuffie couldn't hold on to embarrassment while seeing that smile, and she smiled too.


	5. Part 5: A New Hero

Riku woke up earlier than usual the next morning; the sun still hadn't come up when he looked out the window, though it looked like it was about to. He stood on the balcony outside his windowed door to his bedroom, wearing only a pair of grey sweats. He stood there until the sun peeked over the ocean horizon, then went back inside and back out to the fields behind a line of trees that were behind his house.

Standing in the center, he closed his eyes, and breathed slowly, feeling the morning mist against his arms, his chest, is bare feet, his face. Then without warning, he summoned his keyblade and settled into a ready position. He slashed left, right, threw his torso back and kicked up, doing a perfectly balanced back flip and landing lightly on his feet, and spinning and crouching at the same time to add momentum to his low swing right, the slashing back up diagonally. Then he let go of the keyblade, letting it fall down before catching in his opposite hand in a reverse grip and slashing horizontally across his body then stabbing back.

Riku continued his dance for many minutes, and then with a final stab down into the ground, finished. He finally opened his eyes, breathing hard, to see King Mickey in front of him at the edge of the clearing, silently applauding. "Very good Riku, it has been a long time since I saw such skill with a blade. Do you do this every morning?"

"Thank you, your Majesty. And not always in the morning, but at some point I try to get some time in at least once a day. How long have you been watching?" Riku asked as he used a towel to wipe the sweat and dirt off his body and dry his hair.

"I only caught about the last minute or two of movements. Mind if we go for a walk?" Mickey asked.

"Not at all. Let me go change, I'll be back out in just a minute." Riku came back out a few minutes later, wearing a white tank top and pair of long blue shorts.

"No shoes?" Mickey asked.

"It's a nice enough day outside; I don't think I'll need them." Riku chuckled as they left to follow a path along the beach.

The pair was silent for a few minutes, then Mickey finally said, "So as you probably guessed, I'm not here just for a social visit. I come with more urgent business today."

"I had figured. What's your urgent business?" Riku asked.

"There's trouble among the Worlds again, I fear. Heartless and Nobodies, among other things, are becoming more prevalent as time passes." King Mickey replied in a somber tone.

"Nobodies? I thought we finished off the Organization?" Riku said, surprised.

"You did, but that doesn't mean there are no more Nobodies. You and Sora destroyed the generals, but the army remains, so to speak. They have no guiding force now, and so they wander aimlessly. Same thing with the Heartless. But starting last year, it seems like there are more, and that there may be a force guiding each of the groups. Their attacks are becoming more focused, more coordinated. The situation has been wearing down some of the Worlds and their people. No true damage has been done yet, but it could happen soon. The only upside we have is that the two groups still fight each other when they encounter each other."

"I see. How come you need us? Without their leaders and without overwhelming numbers, the groups are easily enough defeated by the Worlds' warriors, or even militia." Riku said.

"I didn't come here to ask you and Sora to come help fight off random mobs of Heartless and Nobodies." King Mickey Replied with a chuckle. "I have soldiers that have been deployed, in addition to the warriors of the Worlds' native populations for that. I came here to ask for your help in a related, but different matter."

"My help? Not Sora's?" Riku was a bit confused at this.

"Yes, yours. While Sora is powerful as well, you're the one with the powers and skills I need. While Sora is a straightforward and strong fighter, you are not quite as physically strong, though you're close . . . but you are very fast, very efficient, and think tactically and strategically. And that makes you a better fighter. And for this, I need the best." Mickey said in a voice that carried the tone of someone who had practiced and rehearsed his speech.

"What is it you need me for then?"

"I have a group of individuals put together from different worlds. Extremely talented fighters and thinkers, who will hunt down, investigate, and if need be, dispatch the reason for the increasing threats from the darkness. And I know your powers are coming back Riku- I saw you conjure the flame on my scanners when I came in last night. And no, your powers are not the result of malicious intent. You are simply growing and understanding. Will you come with me and join my fight?" King Mickey said with an unsure look on his face.

Riku thought about the situation . . . he could leave with the King and go back to the life he had before the peace. He could fight, be doing good. And even better, his powers were not some uncontrolled shadows of the past. Then he realized he'd be leaving Sora and Kairi behind . . . he thought maybe he shouldould bring them, but decided against it. They deserved, and wanted their peace and happiness here on Destiny Islands. He'd go alone.

He turned to the King and nodded. "When do we leave?"


	6. Part 6: Dancing Flames Reignited

"What kind of ice cream did you say this was? It's delicious!" Axel commented during dessert after him and Yuffie had gone out for dinner.

"It's called Sea-Salt Ice Cream, haven't you had it before?" Yuffie replied.

"I suppose not . . . though it does taste familiar." He said while looking off into the distance. "Oh well I'm sure I'll remember later. So what are the hot tourist sites in the town?"

"I'm not sure we have any 'hot' places . . . uh . . . we have lots of souvenir stands?" Yuffie replied uncertainly.

"What, no night clubs or places to hang out?" Axel asked.

"Well, there is one club on the north end of town, but it's kinda out of the way."

"Then there's no time to waste, let's go! I love dancing." Axel exclaimed and started walking north. Yuffie just sighed with a smile on her face and followed.

They chatted during their walk, talking about each others' favorite this and that, and stories from the past. Axel didn't remember his past though, so he subtly kept the main focus of the conversation on Yuffie, and of course Yuffie didn't notice because she was busy skipping and talking and enjoying herself.

As they neared the night club, Axel asked "So you're a ninja? How well can you fight then?"

Yuffie puffed up her chest and replied proudly and confidently "I'm the best ninja ever! I can beat anyone!"

"I'm sure you could, you're very intimidating." Axel laughed.

"Hey don't mock me! I bet I could kick your butt!" Yuffie shot back playfully, which of course made Axel only laugh harder. "Can you fight then?" Yuffie asked.

"I dunno. I've never tried." Axel responded. To Axel, that statement was true, as far as he knew. He had no memories of ever getting into any fights.

As they turned down the next street towards the night club, they fell quiet and enjoyed the evening stars. Then all of a sudden there was a ripple of shadow on the ground in front of them, and a large group of Neoshadows materialized in front of Axel and Yuffie, looked around, and saw the pair, and leaped for the attack. Both Yuffie and Axel moved to shove each other out of the way at the same moment, which only resulted in Yuffie bouncing off Axel and falling backwards out of harm's way.

Yuffie watched with fear in her eyes as the first Neoshadow collided with Axel, its claws digging deep into his arms. Axel yelped in pain, then twisted and threw the Heartless off, only to have two more land on him, bringing him to the ground under their combined weight, their claws cutting into his torso. He thrashed and tried to get them off, but his arms were weak from losing so much blood all of a sudden.

As one of the Neoshadows went for Axel throat with its claws, a large shuriken flew by and severed its arm, cause it to fall to the ground beside axel and disintegrate. On the return trip, the shuriken cut through the chest of the one armed Neoshadow and beheaded the second, releasing Axel from their grips, though Axel was already blind from pain and nearly unconscious, bleeding heavily all the while.

Yuffie had no time to congratulate herself though as more Neoshadows, recognizing her as the bigger threat, began to charge and leap at her. She dodged the first attacks, and even managed to get in a few counter attacks, but there were simply too many. Pretty soon all her efforts were focused on defense, and couldn't get in a counter attack anywhere. There were simply too many.

x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x

Axel finally managed to open his eyes, only to see Yuffie in trouble and almost defeated by exhaustion. At seeing this, a rage ignited inside him, a rage at seeing his only friend he had in danger. The rage channeled into his fists and feet, which ignited into flames. He leaped to his feat, then jumped nearly 30 feet to the closest heartless, leading with a kick flying that ignited and destroyed the Neoshadow on contact. He spun and threw is fist out, connecting with another Neoshadow and obliterating it as well. The process repeated itself, with Axel kicking and punching every Neoshadow within reach and moving ever closer to Yuffie.

But Axel didn't get to Yuffie in time, and she was finally struck by a Heartless and fell to the ground wounded. Axel screamed in rage and fear, and threw both his hands out towards her and the Heartless surrounding her, and a river of flame filled the street in front of him. Axel extinguished it quickly though, thinking he had engulfed Yuffie in it as well, and ran through the smoke towards where he had last seen her.

He finally found her, covered in the ash from the Heartless he had destroyed, but unaffected by the flame he had cast. Yuffie took his hand and stood up, and smiled and said "I guess this means you can fight, huh?"

Axel managed a small smile and replied weakly "I . . . suppose . . . so," before collapsing to the ground unconscious. His wounds were serious, and his exertions and brought the heavy bleeding back.

"Axel! No! Stay awake!"


	7. Part 7: Departure and Arrival

Early the next morning as Riku was packing his things, he glanced over at the note on his nightstand that he planned to leave for Sora and Kairi, explaining where he'd gone. But as he thought about it, maybe this was something better done in person, they were his best friends after all, and deserved to be able to ask questions. He finished packing his bags, out on his typical yellow shirt and jeans, then walked downstairs and paused at his open door, looking one last time at the house he had built himself 3 years ago. Quietly saying his mental goodbye to his home, he shut the door and left, the lock clicking with an audible finality.

Riku walked down the beach to Sora and Kairi's house, and as he was about to knock he stopped, his hand in the air. _What if they try to convince me to stay? _Riku asked himself. _No. I will leave. They can't stop me, I need this._ He brought his hand to his pocket and pulled out the envelope containing the letter and set it on Sora's doorstep. _Kinda cliché' but I guess it works._ Riku chuckled to himself, and he turned and walked away. Before he had gotten even ten steps away though, he heard the door open.

"Riku!" Kairi's voice rang out. "What's this?" she asked, picking up the envelope. Riku just sighed to himself and turned around. _Guess I'm not getting out of talking to them after all._ Kairi was already reading the letter, and she started to tear up. "You're leaving?"

"Yeah." Riku replied. What else was he going to say?

"Without telling us?"

"It was easier for me this way."

At this point, Sora walked out of the house, noticed Riku's bags, and asked "Oh we packed for something? Where we going?" But then he noticed the letter in Kairi's hand, and started reading.

"_We're_ not going anywhere, Sora. I'm leaving with King Mickey." Riku explained softly. This wasn't going as planned.

"Well we'll come with you!" Sora replied.

"It's not a vacation, Sora," came King Mickey's voice from behind Riku. "I've asked Riku to help me with something, and he agreed. I'm sorry for taking him from you, but I need his help."

Sora now looked almost as sad as Kairi. "Can he at least stay another day or two so we can say our final goodbyes?"

"No." came Riku's quick response. "It's an urgent matter, and important. We must be leaving as soon as we can and-"

King Mickey interrupted, "Actually Riku, we can compromise. We must stop off at Radiant Garden for supplies on the way, they can accompany us and you can speak on the journey. I'm sure Cid will lend them a ship for the journey back."

Riku looked uncertain, but Kairi jumped on the opportunity. "Yes, we'll go. Thank you King Mickey. Me and Sora will just grab some clothes and snacks and we'll be back in a flash." With that, Kairi dragged Sora back inside.

"Is this necessary? We should've just left." Riku said.

"It'll keep everyone mostly happy, and saying goodbyes is always good for you, Riku."

"Alright, if you say so."

Kairi and Sora ran out of the house with backpacks, and the group walked to King Mickey's shuttle and left for Radiant Garden. Kairi and Sora got to hear why Riku was leaving, though he did censor himself so as to not give away his darker powers, or the nature of King Mickey's mission, only giving them the basics. And after a while they all started to talk and laugh, accepting that Riku was leaving.

A light above the cockpit started beeping, and Riku said "We're getting close to Radiant Garden." He paused. "And I'm sorry for trying to leave without saying goodbye."

Sora just gave him a light punch on the shoulder and said "Don't worry about it. We know you tried to do what you thought was best. And plus, we're together still and talked, right?"

Riku just smiled at that. "Right. Well lets go, shall we?"

King Mickey nodded his agreement. "We need to see Leon and Cid for our supplies, and they need to see Cid for a ship back, so we can all go to the same direction."

Riku nodded. He supposed everything didn't work out to badly in the end.


	8. Part 8: Thankful

Axel felt nothing, no pain, no sensation. More like floating. Curious, he tried to open his eyes, and found he could. He looked right, saw a wall, looked left, and saw Yuffie sitting in a chair next to him, asleep.

That's when he noticed he was not floating, but in fact just laying down on a really soft and comfortable bed. _Hmmm . . . if this is the bed I get every time I get hurt, I should try it more often._ He looked down at himself, and saw his shirt off and on the dresser, in shreds.

Covering him instead were a rather large amount of bandages, going up from his stomach and covering his chest and shoulders, as well as a multitude of bandages covering his entire left arm, and only some stitches on his right arm. _Wow, I got really messed up. At least my pants are still intact and on though._ Axel decided to sit up, but halfway up his entire upper body erupted in pain, causing him to fall back onto the bed and gasp in pain. Yuffie jerked awake at hearing a noise from him.

"Axel!" she cried out in relief. He just groaned in response, holding his side. "Oh, Aerith said not to move or anything for a while, you're still kinda injured."

"Only kinda?" He replied. "Uhh . . . this is unpleasant. Are you ok? You're not hurt?" Axel asked looking at her. She nodded that she was fine. That's when he noticed that her eyes were red and puffy, like she had been crying. "Aw have you been crying for poor little me?" He asked teasingly.

"Well- there was a lot of blood- I was worr- eh- um maybe-" Yuffie stuttered in reply "why are you making fun of me!" Yuffie burst.

Axel held his good arm up to try and placate her, "I'm sorry, I was just trying to lighten the mood-"but before he could say anymore she stormed out of the room. "Aw, man."

"'Aw, man' is right." He heard from the hallway, and turned his head to see a woman in a pink outfit with more bandages walking in. "You shouldn't have teased her, she was really worried for you."

"Was not!" they heard from down the hall. The lady in pink just chuckled.

"I take it you're Aerith?" Axel asked.

"That's me. Let me help you sit up so I can change your bandages."

Axel managed to sit up with Aerith's assistance, but it still hurt. "Thank you, by the way. For taking care of me." He saw a green glow behind him and was about to freak out, but then a feeling of such warmth and comfort seeped into him that the thought of the glow being hostile left his mind immediately. "Woah, what was that? That felt amazing."

"It was a healing spell. I've been applying them every time I've changed your bandages the last two days. You were very seriously injured, without them you'd be gone right now." Aerith replied calmly.

"Wow. Again, you have my thanks. Two days though?" Axel asked, surprised.

"Yup, two days." Aerith confirmed. "There we go, the new bandages are set. You should be healed up in another day, then you can move around the house again."

"Nah, I'll be fine. Let me walk around and stretch a bit, I'm sure nothing will attack me in here." He replied confidently.

"Don't be so sure about that!" They heard Yuffie yell from down the hall again. Aerith just chuckled.

"Alright. Just don't push yourself." She leaned close and whispered in his ear, "and if you want to talk to Yuffie again, I'd suggest finding a way to apologize and she'll be over it in no time." She stood back up with a polite smile. "Oh, and don't worry about your shirt, we'll have Yuffie take you shopping when you're better. For now try to keep your bandages open to air though, so your wounds can air out and not get infected. Bye!" And then she left the room with a wave of her hand

Axel took a moment and stood up and walked around the room, stretching his legs and arms as much as he could without too much pain. It felt good to be moving around after so long, even if he didn't remember most of his sit down time.

"Hey everyone! The King and some old friends are stopping by for a visit, they be here in a minute, come say 'hi' when they're here!" Axel heard Leon yell upstairs. _Wow, they know a King? That's cool, I hope I get to meet him_. _What about a shirt though?_ After looking around the room, Axel deduced there wasn't a shirt in there to use for when the King got here.

"Oh well. Aerith _did_ say to let the bandages air out anyways. I have an excuse to not wear a shirt." Axel said. He looked down at his torso. "Not like you can see anything anyways with all these bandages."

With a sigh, he walked down to the room he heard Yuffie yell from, and pushed open the door slowly. He peeked around the door and saw Yuffie sitting on her bed looking out the window. Axel quietly walked up behind her and put his head right next to her right ear and whispered, "Hey cutie!"

"Eep!" Yuffie let out as she jumped up. "Don't sneak up on me like that!"

"Sorry! I just wanted to apologize for making a bad joke at a bad time. Will you forgive me? Axel asked, and his eyes shone sincerely.

Yuffie tried to stay mad, but couldn't hold up that face and caved with a smile. "Yeah I forgive you. But just this time!"

Axel claps his hands once, a smile on his face now too. "Wonderful! Shall we go downstairs to meet this King then?"

"Yup yup! Let's go!"


	9. Part 9: Surprise Reunion

The King and the others made good time though the city to Leon's headquarters, stopping only once to eat; while King Mickey called ahead and told Leon he was stopping by. Kairi naturally tried to make lunch last as long as possible so they could spend more time with Riku, but Riku, his face betraying only a hint of sadness, shook his head almost imperceptibly and she reluctantly stopped.

As the group came into sight of the Defense Center where Leon and the group worked and lived, they saw Aerith coming out. Sora greeted her enthusiastically "Hey Aerith! How's it going?"

Aerith smiled her ever polite smile. "I'm doing good, thank you for asking. How are all of you?"

"We're good. We just came to visit while we travelled with the King and Riku." Sora said.

"Oh, Leon did mention you were stopping by. Why don't you go in and catch up? I'll be back in a moment; I'm just going out to buy more bandages."

Kairi asked, "Bandages? Is somebody hurt? Can we help?"

"No, its fine. We've got him all patched up. Yuffie and her friend were attacked by heartless a couple nights ago."

The King gasped. "Heartless! Here? How'd they get into the city? I thought the defenses were functional."

"I believe they are, but I don't how they got in. You'd have to ask Leon or Cid about that." Aerith replied. "But I really should be going, go on in, I'll be back!" Aerith said as she walked around the corner to the markets.

"I wonder who this guy is." Sora said. "Think we know him?" he asked the others.

"Well, I don't think so, if Aerith thought we knew him she probably would've mentioned it right?" King Mickey replied.

"Yeah, I guess so. Well let's go in then." Sora said, and the knocked before opening the door the rest of the way. The place was simple, without many luxuries in the workroom. Table, bookshelves, computers, everything was very efficient and streamlined. They heard footsteps coming from the next room and turned to see Leon walking in.

"Hey guys, nice of you to drop in." Leon said, shaking everyone hand, and giving a slight bow and inclining his head to King Mickey as he shook his. "Your Majesty."

"Hello Leon. How is everything?" King Mickey said.

Before Leon could respond however, they heard a voice yelling down the stairs. "Leon! Is the King here yet?"

Leon just sighed and shook his head. "Yes, Yuffie, the King and the group are here."

"'The group?' Who's 'the group?'" Yuffie yelled back.

"Why don't you just come down and see?" Leon said back, slight irritation in his voice. He turned back to King Mickey and the others and chuckled. "Ninjas, eh?"

Everyone laughed at that. "Hey I heard that!" Yuffie yelled before sitting on and sliding down the handrail. "Hello King Mickey! Oh Sora! Hey I know who 'the others' are now Leon!" said excitedly.

Leon just rolled his eyes. "Yeah, I figured."

"Axel! Hurry up and get down here slowpoke!" Yuffie yelled back up the stairs.

An irritated voice drifted down the stairs. "Give me a second, will ya? It's kinda hard to get down stairs this injured. Why didn't you help me? Geez."

"Would you stop yelling please Yuffie?" Leon asked, exasperated.

". . . Axel?" Kairi said under her breath. She looked over at Sora, who had a look on his face as if he had heard the name before, but couldn't quite place it. "Don't you remember him?" She asked. Sora, Riku, and King Mickey looked at her.

"It sounds so familiar . . . but I just can't remember. I feel like I should know him." Sora said. King Mickey didn't know who Axel was, but Riku's eyes opened wide as he seemed to remember.

"He's the one that kidnapped Kairi of Destiny Island and brought her to The World That Never Was. He's Organization Thirteen." Riku said, confused.

"Oh yeah! What a jerk! What's he doing here!" Sora said angrily. But then his face lost its tension as he remembered. "Wait . . . he helped me fight off a horde of Nobodies in a corridor of darkness." Sora's eyes opened wide. "He saved me by destroying all of them. But he sacrificed himself when he did, and he faded away. I watched him die." Sora said solemnly. "How's he back here now?"

"I dunno, but let's be careful, just in case. Maybe it's a different Axel." King Mickey said.

As they waited for Axel to get down the stairs, hey sat down at one of the tables while Leon brought out some drinks and snacks. Axel finally got down the stairs, and Kairi and Sora's eyes were wide open. "It is Axel!" Kairi said.

"Of course I'm Axel, who else would I be?" He replied, out of breath and holding his side. He looked like he has been seriously injured, he had no shirt on but his torso and one arm were almost completely covered in bandages anyways.

"Oh have you two met before?" Yuffie asked. Riku was studying Axel's face through this whole exchange. Axel looked really apprehensive, but anxious after realizing that Kairi knew him. What was going on?

Kairi was too confused to be subtle. "Yeah he kidnapped me once!" She blurted out.

"What! Did not!" Axel replied. "Well . . . Actually I don't know."

"What do you mean 'you don't know' Axel? That's not exactly something you forget that easily!" Yuffie said.

"Who cares about that right now, you died!" Sora said. Now Axel looked completely dumbfounded. "You were in Organization Thirteen but you betrayed them and saved me, but faded away and died because you sacrificed yourself. Why am I explaining this to you? You should know this." Sora realized.

"I died? What? I was in an organization? What's a Nobody?" Axel looked truly confused now. Every else was just as confused as Axel, except for King Mickey, who seemed like he understood.

"I think I might have an explanation, though it'll seem far-fetched." King Mickey said.

"Please tell me, I don't have any memories from more than a few days ago. Its been really frustrating." Axel begged.

"Alright. Let's all sit down, and I'll tell you what I know."


	10. Part 10: Revelations and Goodbyes

_**Hey to the few people who read my stories, I apologize for the long time in between stories. I was hospitalized and had some surgery, but I'm on the recovery path now and should be posting new chapters regularly again soon.**_

_**Also, if readers wouldn't mind, if you have an idea for plot or characters or whatever, feel free to message me, and I'll see if I can work out into what I have going in my head. Also, I wanted feedback on adding characters in from the different Final Fantasy games that weren't in Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2, so if you wouldn't mind messaging your opinions on that so I know whether readers would prefer only Kingdom hearts characters or you would be willing to see others in.**_

_**Many thanks, I hope you enjoy.**_

"Before I begin, why don't you three tell Axel what you know about him? See if we can jog his memory." King Mickey said. "It'll give me a little time to organize my thoughts."

"You can't really believe him!" Sora objected. "He could be faking to trick us into trusting him! Or something." Kairi looked like she might've agreed, but kept it to herself and looked ready to listen, and Riku wasn't showing any emotion at all, just listening. Axel looked just plain distressed.

_Faking memory loss to gain trust? Was I really that kind of person? I must've been horrible. What else did I do?_ Despite wanted to know what happened to him and why he couldn't remember anything, he sat and listened patiently as Sora and Kairi told him what they knew about him, including the little they learned about Roxas. Riku added information here and there, but otherwise let them do the talking. He also said he'd talk to Axel privately later, but wouldn't explain why.

Riku spent most of his time talking about the Nobodies, the Organization, and the Heartless, and telling Axel how they were made, what they were, and what they've done, so he might have a better understanding. _I stole people's hearts? By all that is good. . . _

Soon, they finished telling Axel what they knew. Axel was disappointed that they didn't know if he had family or friends he could've known, but he decided he'd take all he could for now. Riku looked toward King Mickey and nodded that they were finished.

"Ahem" Mickey cleared his throat. "This is all speculation and theory, but Master Yensid and I have many reasons to believe that what I'm about to tell you is true, and most likely applies to this situation. When a heart is lost, whether to Heartless, Nobodies, violence, or even natural causes, we know that the heart departs or another place, correct?" Everyone nodded in agreement. "Whether or not all hearts go to Kingdom Hearts or if there is another gathering place of hearts is unknown to us, but we believe there is another place we are unaware of."

"Not all hearts go to Kingdom Hearts, remember that Xemnas and Saix said that they were gathering hearts that were killed by the Keyblade?" Sora interrupted.

Riku out his hand up to stop Sora. "That was different- they were making their own Kingdom Hearts. That wasn't what would be called a real Kingdom Hearts, it was a creation."

"Oh. I didn't know there was a difference." Sora replied in a meek voice. Riku motioned for King Mickey to continue.

"Well, the basic idea of what I was saying is that a heart departs after someone dies. We've discovered though that a heart might not always leave. If a heart had enough connections in life, and if that hearts connections were strong, the bonds between the departing heart and the hearts it's connected to may keep it from leaving. And in the case of Axel here, his strong connections between Roxas, and therefore Sora, and Namine and Kairi, in addition to Riku and others with such strong hearts may have kept his heart from leaving." Mickey said.

Kairi looked skeptical. "But if his heart stayed, how come he became a Nobody? And where is his heartless?"

Axel interrupted "How come Nobodies don't have hearts, but aren't called Heartless?"

"Not important!" Kairi said. "Do you know, King Mickey?"

"A Nobody is a creature with a strong will that came back, just without a heart. It's entirely possible that the heart, after suffering the trauma of death, hides itself away deep inside the Nobody. Still there, but undetectable, so as to protect itself. A strong will also means a strong heart. To come back from being a Nobody, and to come back from what is basically the same as death, means Axel is probably quite powerful." Mickey looked at Sora "He could probably even beat you, Sora."

"No way!" Sora replied.

"I can't even fight!" Axel replied at the same time.

Yuffie spoke up for the first time. "Well, you saved me from all those Heartless didn't you? I think you could probably fight really well!"

"The wave of fire you used to destroy the Heartless was powerful enough to register on and short circuit our computers in that sector too." Squall added. "Why don't we go out back to the training room? We can see how strong you are."

'I dunno. . ." Axel said hesitantly.

But King Mickey came to Axels' rescue. "Actually Squall, I'll take Axel with me and Riku, if he's okay with that. I have more sophisticated facilities we can use."

"Ooh ooh ooh I wanna come too!" Yuffie said excitedly, jumping up and down. "Come on Axel let's go!"

"Uh . . . okay?" He agreed nervously.

"Then it's settled. I will take Riku, Axel and Yuffie back with me." King Mickey said, clapping his hands together. "Everyone get ready and say your goodbyes, we'll leave as soon as everyone's ready."

And two hours later, after a drawn out goodbye, Sora and Kairi said goodbye to Riku and left to go back to Destiny Islands, while Riku left with the King for his castle, and a new adventure.


	11. Part 11: Takeoff

_**NEWS UPDATE: I've decided on a schedule of updating once to twice a week, most likely Sunday and Wednesday evenings. Feel free to send me angry messages if I'm failing to keep up with this. I'll try to give a heads up in the chapter before if I'm going to be late for one reason or another.**_

_** PLEASE READ THIS PART: This is the last chapter before I decide on whether or not to add extra Final Fantasy characters that weren't in Kingdom Hearts 1 or 2 already, let me know if you readers have a preference as to characters or to whether or not to even add them. Thanks again for reading.**_

"Sora and Kairi will be taking my ship home from here; we will be taking one I had Cid prepare specially for us." King Mickey explained to Riku, Axel, and Yuffie. "The autopilot systems will return it to my castle hangar from there."

"I didn't know Cid made you a special ship. Why didn't he tell me?" Yuffie pouted.

"Because I asked Cid to keep it as quiet as possible. I want to minimize our chance of discovery." Mickey replied.

"Oh." Yuffie said sheepishly. Axel just chuckled.

The group continued out of the city and headed towards the castle, which had been repaired and renovated. The building now functioned as Radiant Garden's Research and Development Center, as well as the main building for government officials to work on and store their work.

As they approached the main gate, two guards dressed in chainmail and leather armor stepped forward and blocked the way with their spears. The one on the left spoke first, "Please show me your identification and proper clearance, sir."

King Mickey reached into his coat and pulled out an envelope and handed it over to the guard "Here you go, sir."

The guard opened the envelope and read the papers inside. Halfway through the first page, he stiffened and stood up straight. "Your Majesty! I apologize for not letting you in immediately. I'll have someone escort you to the audience chamber."

"No thank you, I won't be having an audience today. I know where to go." Mickey replied quickly.

"As you wish, sir. Have a good day Your Highness." The guard replied with a bow. He turned to the others and offered a slight bow to them as well.

After they had entered the castle and began walking silently through a series of hallways, Yuffie asked "So how far in are we going? I've never seen this area before."

"I don't doubt it. We're going to a hidden experimental hangar bay. It has our new ship in it, as well as some extra supplies and gear." Mickey replied.

After nearly an hour of walking through winding corridors, they reached the hangar. The door slid open after scanning King Mickey's DNA, and the group got their first look at their new ship. It was very thin and low to the ground, and inside it looked like it would only just be taller than Axel and his head of spiked hair. And it was shaped like an inverted T, but the tips were angled forward into sharp looking blades with cannons attached. The wings also filed down to a razor sharp edge. . . to Riku, it looked like the ship was designed to fire at range and well as do some serious damage if another ship were to try and ram it. The most striking feature though was its coloration- jet black, with angular patterns that were a dark grey, as well as a few lines of silver in intricate wave patterns.

"How come . . . it's not in focus?" Axel asked. Riku looked over and saw that he was squinting at the ship as if it were far away. Yuffie was doing the same thing, and even King Mickey looked like he was squinting at the ship a little bit. He looked back at the ship, but the ship looked perfectly fine to Riku.

"It's part of the light bending technology I had installed, in addition to some magic. It's difficult to find the edges, even if you know where they are. In the shadows of space and in the corridors of darkness, this ship will be nearly invisible, even without its cloaking technology." Mickey explained.

"How come the ship looks like it's in focus to me then?" Riku asked.

"Because of your control over both the light and the dark. To someone with control over neither, or control over only one, the ship will be blurred at the edges and difficult to focus on. To someone like you though, the ship is perfectly clear."

Axel groaned. "Lucky you, Riku. Looking at this ship is giving me a headache. Hopefully its better on the inside."

"The inside is fine; you won't have any trouble focusing in there. Axel, could you and Yuffie go grab those duffel bags?"

"Yeah, sure thing. Let's go Yuffie."

Riku looked closer at the ship, and found he approved. It looked efficient, and powerful. But he had one question. "King Mickey, what's the ships name? Every ship needs a name."

Mickey turned his head to the side and thought. "I hadn't considered giving it a name. Why don't you name it Riku? I'm sure you could come up with something appropriate for the job we're going to be doing."

Riku looked taken aback. "Oh. I guess I'll try to come up with something as we're loading the ship."

They group spent the next few hours loading the ship with supplies, performing diagnostics, and learning the basic controls. Once they were all properly acquainted, they began boarding the ship. Axel turned to Riku as they were boarding. "Hey kid, come up with a name for this baby yet?"

"I think so, if you guys approve. If we're to be hunting Nobodies and Heartless, as well as trying to find out why you came back. . . I think we should call our ship _Heart Seeker._"

Yuffie laughed. "That sounds kinda cheesy, doesn't it?"

Axel gave Yuffie a quick shove. "Hey, be nice. And _Heart Seeker_ is a good name for the ship. I like it."

Mickey nodded his agreement. "Me too. Very well, _Heart Seeker_ it is. Let's go now, we have to meet with the others in the group I'm putting together, and begin some training.

"Training? I don't wanna train! I'm already the best ninja ever!" Yuffie protested.

"Oh shush, there's always more to learn." Axel said, waving his hand dismissively as Riku and Mickey prepared and launched the ship. Axel and Yuffie argued the whole time they were flying until they cleared the world, and then began looking around excitedly to the sights in space they'd never seen before.

Riku, having already seen all this at one point or another, smiled. He was excited for a different reason. He was finally out on an adventure again. He couldn't wait.


	12. Part 12: Disney Castle

_**Hey everyone, I waited an extra day to finish tallying up the info on whether there would be other characters from the other Final Fantasy games introduced, and I got almost exactly a 50-50 split. So to keep it even I'll add in some here and there but not go too far out. Hope you enjoy.**_

During the flight, it was clear that Riku was a quick learner when it came to flying the _Heart Seeker_, and he soon came to take over the piloting of the ship whenever he could, taking it off autopilot to practice maneuvers and to become more and more familiar with the controls. Mickey approved of Riku learning to pilot, he felt that it was good training and he thought it a good precaution that more than one person could fly the ship. Axel liked Riku piloting simply because that meant he didn't have to learn. Yuffie didn't like Riku's piloting because she didn't do well with flying and got airsick easy.

It didn't help that Riku liked practicing evasive maneuvers.

During the flight, Mickey started training Axel in both physical and mental exercises. The physical exercises to test his strength and the mental exercises to see if they could find any memories in Axel's mind. King Mickey offered the same training to Yuffie, but she insisted that she was "the best ninja ever" and didn't need to train while on their flight. Axel just thought it was because she was sick from Riku's flying all the time.

Once they reached Disney Castle, Mickey took over piloting and brought them to his private hangar in the castle grounds, and they all disembarked to find Queen Minnie waiting by the landing pad.

"Hello Minnie!" King Mickey said with a smile, giving her a quick hug, which she returned joyfully. After their embrace ended she looked at the others.

"Are these the last of the warriors you wanted to find?" She asked, looking them all over.

"Almost, there's only one more we have to pick up in a few days. I'm going to go bring them to the rooms with the others and introduce them, then I'll be back and we can go out for dinner, does that sound good?" Mickey asked.

"It does. Enjoy your stay everyone, and good luck with your missions and training. Goodbye!" Queen Minnie said with a wave, and walked back into the castle chambers.

"This way guys, I'll introduce you to the other team members before we turn in for the evening." King Mickey said, leading the way through a set of steel double doors.

"Who are the others in this group?" Riku asked after passing through the doors.

"They're warriors from different Worlds, each with their own area of expertise. Not every world had warriors with the capabilities we need, and some had more than one, but all are capable in their own way. You'll see them in a moment; the bedrooms are just around the corner." Mickey replied.

They turned the corner and Mickey opened a large wooden door and they entered the guest bedrooms, which for the team ended up looking like a dormitory- there was a circular common area with multitudes of couches and tables, with a kitchen and the rest of the living essentials, with some extra luxuries. In equally spaced intervals around the common room were doorways leading to individual bedrooms. All the doors were open, except for one, which was both closed and locked.

"Everyone, listen up. These are the new guys I went to pick up, come introduce yourselves." Mickey said to everyone in the room. "I'm off to go spend a quiet even with Queen Minnie, I'll be back to train with you all tomorrow. Goodnight!" And with that, Mickey left.

Riku looked around. There was an odd mix of people. A man and a woman wearing simple tunics walked up to the newcomers and held out his hand. "Hi, my name is Shang. And this is Mulan."

"Pleasure to meet you." Mulan said with a bow. "I recognize you Riku, you warned us about the heartless dragon several years ago. And you showed Shang here a thing or two about fighting." She said playfully, nudging Shang in the side with her elbow.

Shang laughed along with her, accepting the jab. "I've been training, I'd enjoy seeing how I fare against you now, Riku. Perhaps you will honor me will a duel tomorrow?"

"I would be honored." Riku said with a bow. He turned to Axel and Yuffie and introduced them to Shang and Mulan, then left to go introduce himself to the others. He saw a man with long hair wearing very loose baggy pants and no shirt crouched in front of a table, cleaning a spear.

"Hey, my name's Riku. I'm new to the team." He held his hand out for a handshake.

The man looked over at Riku, and stared. Riku thought that maybe he wasn't going to respond, but then his hand shot out suddenly and vigorously shook Riku's hand. "I Tarzan. Good to meet you." Then he went back to cleaning and maintaining his spear without further word. Riku raised one eye in surprise, but was interrupted by a hand clapping him on the shoulder.

"Don't worry 'bout him lad, he doesn't appear to talk much to anyone 'round here. Though his speaking is remarkably better than when he first got here." A voice said from behind Riku. He turned to see a man standing mere inches from his face, and nearly fell back in surprise, and from the smell of rum. "Welcome to the crew boy, I be Captain Jack Sparrow. And you are?"

"I'm Riku. Nice to meet you, Captain." Riku said.

"Riku you say? You wouldn't happen to know an odd boy by the name of Sora, would you? I heard he was looking for you . . . some time ago. I forget when. Lots of rum, you see." Sparrow replied, waving his bottle around.

Riku let out a laugh. "Yeah I know Sora. And yes, he found me."

"Splendid! How about a drink to celebrate?"

"I'll pass. Feel free to enjoy some yourself, though."

"That is a great idea. I'll go do that." Jack said, taking a swig from his bottle and dropping down onto a fur covered couch with purple covers. However, when he landed, the couch gave a great roar and grew in size. "Aaaah!" Jack yelled in surprise. "Foul couch! You dare challenge me!"

The couch whirled around, showing a mouthful of fangs and large clawed hands. "I am NOT a couch, Sparrow!" the former couch roared.

"Ah, Beasty, my apologies. You really should stop sitting on the ground like that. Come, meet our new ally here, Riku. Riku, this is Beast." Jack said, waving his arms back and forth. Beast just looked down at Riku, and gave a snort. "Greetings." Then he quickly walked into his room and slammed the door.

"Irritable creature, he is. It was only the third time I've done that." Jack said as he walked over to another couch, prodding it with his foot before deciding it was safe to sit down. Riku just smiled and shook his head.

"Well, these new people are definitely interesting, wouldn't you say?" Axel said, walking up next to Riku, Yuffie following close behind.

"Yeah they are!" Yuffie said, interrupting Riku before he could respond. "Who do you think is in the locked room over there? That person never came out to say 'hi!'" and before Axel or Riku could protest, Yuffie skipped on over and knocked on the door. "Helloooo! Are you gonna come out and say 'hi' to us new people?" Yuffie yelled to the door. There was silence from the room for a few moments and then footsteps. The door opened, and a man in a long red coat with graying hair and one arm up inside his coat stood in the doorway, looking down at Yuffie. "Hi, sir! I'm Yuffie."

He stood there for a moment more. "Hi." Then he closed and locked the door again.

"Uh! How rude!" Yuffie pouted. "He didn't even tell us his name."

"He Auron." Tarzan said. "He not talk a lot." Then Tarzan left and walked into his room.

"Wow. I hope the new guy Mickey said we were supposed to get is a bit more sociable." Axel said. "This seems like an awfully mixed up group we have going here."

"Yeah, but I know some of them, and have heard of the some of the others. They are all powerful fighters, and loyal. We should be fine. Hey uh, Jack? Do we just pick a room, or are they assigned or something?" Riku said.

"Feel free to pick whatever strikes your fancy. Just not those two." He said, pointing. "Those two are mine."

"Both?" Yuffie asked.

"Yes."

"Um. . . ok. I want that one!" and Yuffie rushed into a room and began examining it.

Riku and Axel looked at each other and shrugged. The next few days would be interesting.


	13. Part 13: Night Conversations

Riku sat up most of the night of the night, unable to sleep. He was anxious about training tomorrow, because even though he had been practicing his swordplay at least once a day for the last few years and was in excellent shape, he still understood the truth that for those last few peaceful years he hadn't actually practiced against or with anyone. Sora didn't like practicing anymore, and though Kairi wanted to humor Riku once or twice he always declined because she was obviously not a challenge at all, and would have been pointless. He had taught her here and there, but that didn't help him. And so he was worried about getting embarrassed tomorrow, about getting beat because he had no one to fight.

"Heh. At least I'm pretty sure I'll be able to beat the drunk Captain." Riku mused out loud.

"Beat who now?" A voice said from Riku's slightly opened door. He recognized it as Yuffie's voice. "And can I come in?"

"Yeah sure. And nobody, I was just thinking out loud." Riku responded. "What's up?

"Nothing, I just can't sleep. How come you're still awake?" Yuffie asked while plopping down on a chair next to Riku's bed.

"I can't sleep either, just thinking about tomorrow. Wondering if I'm as good a fighter as I used to be." Riku explained

"Oh, I'm sure you'll do fine Riku!" Yuffie exclaimed. Then she covered her mouth because she feared she might've said that too loudly and woken the others in their rooms. After both of them listened for a moment though, there was no unhappy noises so they guessed no one woke. "Oopsies."

Riku chuckled. "Not so loud next time. Was there something you wanted to talk about?" Riku could see with his darkness enhanced vision that she was a little fidgety about something.

Yuffie looked down at her feet, which she was swinging back and forth while she sat. "Actually, yeah if you don't mind...?"

"Of course, ask away." Riku obliged.

"Well, you're a guy, and-" she started.

"Thanks for noticing." Riku interjected as a joke.

"Hey!" She replied, with a playful smile. "I'm trying to be serious here."

"I know. And the answer is yes, probably." Riku grinned.

"You don't even know what I was going to ask!"

"Well, then ask."

"As I was saying, since you're a guy and probably understand guys better than me, do you think… um… that a guy like Axel could ever…uh…like… a girl like… me?" Yuffie finally stuttered.

"What's this?" Riku chuckled. "The ever confident Yuffie made nervous by a guy?"

"I'm not nervous! I'm just… yeah I'm nervous." She pouted.

Riku let out a soft laugh. "It's alright to be nervous. But I don't know, I think Axel might have a thing for that Mulan girl." He joked.

Yuffie sighed and looked downcast. "I knew he didn't like me."

Riku looked at her, decided that he couldn't see her that sad, then poked her so he could tell her the truth. "Alright, that was a bad joke, I didn't think you'd be that easily lied to about that. He doesn't have a thing for Mulan, I was kidding."

"Hey!" Yuffie pushed him playfully. "Don't do that to me. Girls are sensitive about that stuff."

"I'm sorry, geez." Riku said, laughing. "But my answer is still what I said earlier- 'yes, probably.'"

Yuffie nearly jumped up with excitement "Yee!" but then she settled down. "How do you know though?"

"I'm a guy. We just know these things." Riku said with a wink. "You guys get along great, and it's easy to see you two care for each other. You both nearly killed yourselves trying to save each other from Heartless, and you were obviously worried about him when he was hurt." He explained.

"But that could just mean we are friends though, right? And doesn't that mean I only like him? It doesn't mean he likes me." Yuffie said, which to Riku made it obvious she was nervous about rejection because she as casting about for reasons to doubtful of his feelings.

"Just think about it Yuffie. Did he do anything someone who was 'just a friend' wouldn't have bothered to do?" he asked.

"Uh… he did go out of his way to apologize after teasing me? And he was really sweet about it too." She remembered. "Maybe he does like me!"

"I'm sure he does. Just give it time, and I'm sure he'll act on it. Or if you don't feel like waiting, you could always do something about it." Riku suggested with a chuckle.

"I dunno, I'll see how long he waits then!" Yuffie said cheerfully. "Thank you so much Riku!" she said while giving a quick hug. "I'll leave you so you can sleep now I guess? I think I'm gonna go catch some sleep now that I'm not so worried." She finished with a smile.

"No problem Yuffie. Goodnight." With that Yuffie gave Riku a goodbye hug and skipped out of the room, a smile on her face.

Riku was glad to be of some help, but as soon as his door closed his smile faded away. It would be romantic to see Yuffie and Axel together, but he was worried that it was compromise the team if the couple focused too much on each other instead of the group.

_ When did I become so cold and cynical about relationships? I should be happy that they might be together, a joining of hearts is always a good thing. _Then a sudden realization hit, and he knew. Because helping Yuffie with someone she liked brought back memories of someone he had liked. He knew that the reason he was so cold about the joining of two hearts was because his heart never had that joining, despite how much he wanted it. Because the one he gave his heart to darkness for all those years ago had not picked him.

He lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, silently replaying the happy moments in his past when he was with her. What if he had been this? What if he had done that? But Riku gave up on playing the "what if" game quickly and relaxed, then fell asleep.

And he dreamed of another time and place, where he was with Kairi, their hearts joined in love.


	14. Part 14: Getting Acquainted

The next morning, Axel and Riku awoke early to observe and become acquainted with the routine around the facility, to find the training rooms, dining hall, familiarizing themselves with the layout in general. Shang, an early riser, was generous enough to provide a tour and provide details about shortcuts and routes over a breakfast of eggs and toasted bread. After eating, Shang led the duo to the training hall, where they found Auron training in a simulation ring, apparently having decided to skip breakfast.

"Auron is the best warrior here." Shang commented as they watched Auron moving about the ring, cutting down the combat dummies with powerful strokes. "On the third day here, Jack proposed we all spar with him at once as a joke, and he accepted. He defeated all of us so quickly that I'm not sure if the match last longer than a minute."

Axel's jaw had dropped to his chest at hearing that. "You can't be serious, all of you? Man, I never want to fight him." He finished, eyeing Auron warily. "And how is he so strong and fast? He's got graying hair, he must be getting up there in years."

"We don't know how old he is, actually. He never mentions it. But don't let his aging appearance fool you, not only is he strong and fast, it seems very hard to hurt him. As if he isn't just flesh and blood." Shang replied.

"Okay, now you're just trying to scare me, aren't you?" Axel managed to say, as he slowly inched his way behind Riku. Shang just smiled.

Shang turned to Riku, and gestured toward one of the many arenas that were dotted across the large room. "Shall we have our match? How about just one of the flat arenas, no traps or obstacles to worry about?"

Riku nodded. "Sounds good. What weapons to we use? I'm not sure that hitting each other with swords will be too healthy."

"No, there are plenty of different training weapons around here to use. Wooden ones are the most common, but there are other ones made of other materials, to change the weights if you prefer."

"Wooden is fine. Shall we?" Riku said as he fingered several weapons in the weapon rack and picked out a curved wooden sword.

Shang grabbed a thin straight wooden sword. "A katana, huh? You didn't seem the type, I thought you would've picked up a more traditional long sword."

"It feels right, the fighting style and weight feels similar to my keyblade." Riku explained while flourishing the katana to get a feel for its weight. Riku was slightly nervous about how the match would go as he was picking the weapon, but now that the match was about to start he was calm and collected. He shifted to a ready position, blade above his head and pointed towards Shang, who was in his ready position, holding his blade in front of him with both hands.

They both stood staring at each other, focusing on waiting to see who would give away their first move. Shang ended the silence and made the first move, jumping at Riku and thrusting with his blade. Riku, who had found the quiet peace in himself, did not react to the aggressive charge like most fighters, jumping or blocking wildly, but instead just shifted his weight to the left, dodging the thrust by a hair and pivoting, still without moving his feet, and quick as lightning had his wooden katana against Shang's throat.

Shang, who had frozen in place at feeling Riku's weapon on his throat, stepped back and gave Riku a short bow of respect. "I've never seen someone move that fast before, that was quite impressive Riku. You've trained well. And it seems I must train more as well!" He added with a warm laugh.

There was excited clapping outside the arena, and Riku and Shang turned to see Yuffie and Mulan sitting on stools, apparently walking in while they were staring at each other before the match. Jack was there too, but it seemed he had opted out of a stool and was just lying on his side on the ground, head propped in his hand. With a bottle of rum in his hand, of course. "Impressive mate, you would make a good pirate. Fancy joining me crew after this business with ol' Kingy is said and done? You and me, the high seas- its freedom, lad. Nothing better than that."

As Riku opened his mouth to respond, there was a pair of loud thuds in another arena. He turned to see Axel and Tarzan laying on their backs, groaning, and Beast standing over them. Beast grunted in disappointment, it seems that the fight was not quite the challenge he was hoping for. He picked up Axel as he left, and took him to a weapon rack to help him pick out a weapon.

"Seems ol' Beasty is taking care of training up the redhead. Shall I train you up then, boy?" Jack commented, then put his arm (still carrying the rum bottle, of course) around Riku's shoulders and led him to an arena away from the one that Shang, Mulan, and Yuffie were now using.

Riku was incredulous. "YOU'RE going to train me? Aren't you a bit. . . inebriated?"

"Of course I am!" Then proceeded to push Riku into an arena that had wooden poles scattered throughout it as obstacles, limiting the area one could move and swing a weapon. Riku still had his katana, which suited him just fine, and Jack picked up what looked like a thin, wooden cutlass. "But that's all part of the fun of it!" He said with a flair, which would've been more impressive if he hadn't stumbled into a pole at the same time. "En garde, boy!" He yelled as he flourished his blade and staggered towards Riku.

With a sigh, Riku lazily lifted his blade to parry Jack's drunken swing at Riku's side, only to find that the pirate's blade wasn't quite where he thought it was, and Riku staggered backwards, holding his thigh. What had just happened?

Jack smiled, his eyes suddenly clearer than they had been a moment before. "What's wrong lad, something catch you on the leg?" His smile held a hint of mischief, knowing that Riku had underestimated him. "Maybe you should watch your step, be a little more careful, ya know?" He began to circle around Riku slowly, weaving in and out of the wooden poles, seemingly drunk once more.

Riku knew he had been played, and acknowledged it with a smile and a nod to Jack. Maybe this wouldn't be as easy as he thought.


	15. Part 15: Shadow Warrior & Dancing Flames

Axel sighed. "What am I _doing_ here; I'm not good enough to compete with these guys." Axel had no say in whether he got to leave or not, as he was still stuck in Beast's grip, being dragged towards a weapon rack after disappointing Beast in a two on one match with Tarzan. Axel definitely thought that Tarzan would've been able to hold his own against Beast, but Axel had tripped himself up and fallen into Tarzan and caused them both to stumble, giving Beast an opening to use his enormous hands to grab and thrown both Axel and Tarzan down onto their backs. And judging by the dark look that Tarzan shot Axel after the match, Tarzan held that same belief.

Beast dropped Axel on his stomach in front of a wall covered in weapon racks, containing dozens upon dozens of weapons, wood and otherwise. "Pick a few to practice with. Find one that feels right. Come back after." Beast growled quietly. He then turned and walked away, motioning to Tarzan, and both of them began running through an obstacle course with their loping, hunched over strides, leaping over walls, diving under poles, dodging around swinging contraptions. As he watched them make their way through the course, he had a fleeting thought that Tarzan moved as much like a beast as Beast did. He made a note to himself to ask about that later.

But he figured he should do as Beast said and start training if he was gonna get into any shape to stay on par with the other fighters. Looking up and down the racks, nothing in particular stood out as something he would enjoy wielding. With a shrug, he picked up a random weapon here and there and took them to a target dummy. Looking at the wooden weapons he had in his arms, he had a choice of a long sword, a greatsword, a quarterstaff, a double bladed staff, and a spear. "Man, look at all these. It's a wonder anyone knows how to fight with all these choices." With a shrug, he grabbed the wooden spear and turned to give it a go against the target dummy. Before he could swing though, he glanced at Riku, and then did a double take as he saw what was going on.

Riku was in an arena with that pirate, Jack, and there was a fight going on he did not expect to see. Axel was sure that Riku was a decent fighter, from what he had seen in his training on the _Heart Seeker_, and because King Mickey picked him for this group of elite fighters. But he did not expect to see a fight like the one he was watching now. Riku was a blur of movement, his wooden sword whistling though the air, his footwork dancing him around and though the forest of wooden poles, his waist long silvery-white hair trailing behind him like stream of liquid metal.

What truly surprised Axel though was Jack. The pirate had smelled of alcohol last night, and still smelled of alcohol this morning, and had even been drinking right before this match with Riku. But, despite all appearances, he was matching Riku blow for blow. He wasn't jumping around or whirling about like Riku was, only shuffling and turning to follow Riku's swings, his wooden cutlass parrying and turning aside Riku's swings right before they would hit him.

It was hard to look away, but Axel managed to look around long enough to see that everyone was watching the match. Yuffie, Shang, and Mulan stopped their sparring to watch. Tarzan and Beast, who had been in the process of climbing a tower, stopped their climb and just hung there, watching. Even Auron stopped his training and sat down with his enormous sword across his lap to watch. Axel looked back at the fight again just in time to see Riku trick Jack into putting too much force into a swing, and as Jack was overbalanced for that fraction of a second Riku slid under the cutlass and slid past the pirate, and brought his sword down on the side of Jack's thigh, bringing Jack down to one leg. Before Jack could recover, Riku swung his wooden katana up in front of Jack's face. Jack stared at the tip, going a bit cross-eyed. With a finger he pushed the tip down and away from his face. "Parley?" he asked with a smile on his face. "Maybe there isn't much I have to teach you in a fight after all, boy."

Riku smiled, and reached down to help Jack up. Axel managed to close his mouth and recover from the shock, and turned back around to try to find if any of these wooden weapons felt right to use. "Boo!"

"Ah!" Axel fell backwards onto his bum as Yuffie jumped up and startled him.

"Gotcha!" Yuffie said with a giggle. She pulled Axel to his feet. "You have to pay more attention to your surroundings! Or else how would you ever get better at fighting?"

"Oh hush Yuffie." Axel replied, exasperated. "Why don't you help me figure out which of these is the best for me to use? Know any way to figure it out?"

"Yup! Like this." Yuffie picked all of the weapons up, and then threw around the arena they were standing in, spreading them out all over the floor. "Now pick one up and let's fight!" she said as she got out her giant shuriken.

"Hey hey hey wait wait wait! That's sharp!" He said as he dived away from her first swing, picking up the quarterstaff as he rolled to his feet. As he spun to face her, he managed to get the staff up just in time to deflect a series of swings, but within seconds Yuffie managed to get her shuriken inside of his guard and knock the staff away. As she swung again, his only option was to dive away again and try to pick up another weapon. As he reached for the nearest weapon, the greatsword, Yuffie managed to flip towards him and deliver a powerful kick to Axel's side, sending him tumbling across the arena. He managed to hold onto the sword, however, and jumped to his feet and charged back at Yuffie, greatsword trailing behind him, low and ready to swing. With a roar, he swung the sword, knocking Yuffie's shuriken away from him, and deflected a return blow.

This dance went back and forth for a few minutes, Axel gaining more and more confidence by the moment. He even started having fun, and was smiling now. He got to careless though, and Yuffie managed to knock the greatsword out of his hands. Axel staggered backwards, and Yuffie vaulted backwards, throwing the shuriken at Axel. Axel threw his hands up to block, and then realized he had no weapon to block the shuriken with.

_No. To me! _He called out in his mind, strangely calm. With a burst of flame, two spinning chakrams appeared, floating, in front of Axel's hands, and they deflected the shuriken away and back to Yuffie, who caught it while staring open mouthed at the chakrams. "Where did those come from?" she asked.

". . . I have no idea."


	16. Part 16: So, Why'd You Join?

Riku was tired. Jack was definitely a better fighter than Riku would've ever thought before, he thought as he helped Jack to his feet. Despite his tired muscles, Riku was happy. He was training, actually training, and not just swinging a keyblade through the air at imaginary enemies. And soon, King Mickey would have a mission for him and the others, once the last member was recruited.

After watching the interesting turn of events in the impromptu fight between Axel and Yuffie, Riku strode over to ask about these new weapons that Axel had summoned. Jack spoke first, saying "Well, that's not something you see every day. And here I thought only that fancy keyblade of Sora's could do that shiny transport . . . thing."

Riku just shook his head, saying "Sora's not the only one with a keyblade either, Jack." As he said this, Riku held out his hand and summoned _Way to the Dawn._ "See? And King Mickey has one too, as well as another friend of mine."

Jack was surprised, "How many of the bloody things are there? And here I thought getting my hands on one would've been special." He grumbled.

Auron responded for Riku, explaining "There are many Keyblades in existence, and they are all special. Each chooses its owner." Finished with his short explanation, he turned to Axel and Riku. "The Keyblades are powerful weapons, but you should carry another with you anyways. You never know what could happen, or what enemies you'll face, or what they can do to put you at a disadvantage." Auron then waved his hand, and suddenly Axel's weapons and Riku's keyblade.

Riku looked at his now empty hand in shock. He tried to summon his keyblade again, and found that when he reached with his mind, instead of finding his blade and pulling it into existence, he mind hit a solid wall. He tried again, focusing harder, and was rewarded with only a headache for his efforts. "That's impressive, how did you do that? I've never had that happen before." Riku asked Auron, all the while probing the wall for weaknesses with his mind.

"Magic, of course. Or to be more exact, the absence of it. It's very difficult to learn, and takes many years to perfect. But that doesn't mean no one we face will know how to do that. Find another weapon, and carry it with you, learn it like you have your keyblade, and you'll have two weapons, and not just one that you can use masterfully." Auron lectured with the air of someone teaching a student, and Riku found himself taking this advice to heart.

"I will." He said with a nod. The break of a door opening was heard, and everyone, who had all gathered together at this point, turned to see King Mickey walking in, dressed for travel. Everyone bowed, or at least nodded their head, as he approached.

Once again, Jack was the first to speak, opening with "Hello my fair Majesty. Do we finally have a setting? I love a good shore leave as much as the next man, but I've been itchin' to do some traveling and adventurin'."

"Not yet, in a few more days I'll be ready. I'm leaving now to find and recruit our last member, hopefully he's feeling charitable. Why don't you all grab lunch, and get to know each other better? I'll see you all again in a few days, train hard!" Mickey said, waving and then leaving.

"Oooh I wonder who this last person is?" Yuffie said. "I guess we'll find out soon! Let's eat! Yay!"

Everyone either smiled at her cheerfulness, shook their heads exasperatedly, or just ignored the bought of cheerfulness and proceeded to the kitchens and mess hall to eat. Riku decided on a meal of some fresh vegetables and a generous portion of fish that smelled like the fish he would catch at home. As they began eating though, Yuffie once again stuck up conversation. "So why did you guys all chose to fight with King Mickey?" she asked, looking around at all the people at the table.

Shang and Mulan answered first, "A few months ago, our world was attacked by Heartless. A lot of Heartless. We had no warning and weren't prepared, so within the first night our armies were being pushed back to the Imperial City." Mulan explained. Shang just stared at his food, a look of sadness and anger crossing his face. "It wasn't your fault Shang, we had no idea." She said, rubbing his shoulder in comfort. "We began to hold our ground, and kept from being pushed back, but we couldn't force them back either. We thought it was a stalemate that we would eventually lose, but after a week King Mickey showed up. He brought with him an army from Disney Castle, and attacked the Heartless from behind. We charged the front after we saw what he was doing, and crushed the Heartless between us quickly. After that he left a few divisions of soldiers to train our soldiers in how to fight the Heartless, and in return we joined this mission to repay the favor." Mulan took a breath. "Well, that was a mouthful, wasn't it?" she laughed as she returned to her food.

Yuffie turned to Tarzan next, asking the same question. Tarzan replied "Jane is here, so I am here." then returned to eating. Yuffie's faced scrunched up in confusion, until Mulan cleared it up.

"Tarzan and Jane are important to each other." She explained. "King Mickey asked Jane to be part of his research team that is studying the Heartless, in the upper levels of the castle. Tarzan came with her, and joined us at Jane's urging so that they could be nearby each other."

"Ooooh," Yuffie replied. "What about you Beast? And is your name really Beast?"

"No. I came because King Mickey and Belle asked my to."

"Belle?" asked Axel.

"My princess. I'm a prince." Explained Beast.

"Oh how romantic!" Yuffie said, smile on her face, clapping happily. "Does she call you Beast too?"

"No." then Beast turned back to his food.

"Fine I won't ask then," Yuffie pouted. "What about you Auron? Why do you fight with King Mickey?" Riku's ears pricked up at this, Auron was still a mystery to him, and naturally he wanted to learn a bit more about him.

"I fight because I am a Guardian. And a Guardian without something to guard is a poor Guardian indeed." He replied.

"There isn't anything to guard on your world?" Yuffie asked playfully. Auron's eye twitched ever so slightly, and Riku would never have noticed if he wasn't watching so closely. But Axel must've noticed too.

"Yuffie, don't say things like that, you're being rude." He said, putting a hand over hers. Yuffie blushed slightly, and Riku was unsure if it was because Axel had his hand on Yuffie's, or if she was embarrassed at being rude to Auron.

"Sorry, Auron, I didn't mean to be rude."

"It's fine. But you're right. There isn't anything to guard on my world anymore. It was destroyed during an invasion by Heartless many years ago." Auron said, drawing everyone's attention to him. It seemed no one had bothered to ask this, or he had never deigned to respond if they had. "My world, Spira, was filled with many powerful warriors of all sorts. Swordsman, soldiers, mages, pilots, Al-Bhed machina creations. But it wasn't enough to fight this new enemy we had never faced before, and we were overwhelmed and destroyed, and even the Farplane, where the dead dwell, fell to the Heartless. And that's when I died a second time, and was sent elsewhere." He then explained how many of the souls on his world had fled to other worlds, and he had ended up at Olympus Coliseum, and the events that had transpired with Sora.

"Hold on, I'm sorry if I sound a bit slow, but what do you mean you 'died a second time'?" Axel asked after Auron had finished his explanation. "It's not like you can have a case of 'deadness' and then get better, right?"

"You're one to talk." Riku chipped in, with a chuckle.

"Oh. Good point." Axel said.

Auron nodded a subtle 'thank you' to Riku, not wanting to explain how he was alive once more, and continued with his explanation after Axel went back to eating. "And now Yuna, Tidus, and the others I fought alongside are gone, I have no one left to guard. So I joined King Mickey, so that I can try to redeem my failure."

"Did you say 'Yuna,' Auron?" Yuffie said quickly. "Shoulder length brown hair, long ponytail in the center of it? One blue eye and one green eye?"

Auron stopped eating, and suddenly went very still. "How do you know that?" He whispered.

"There's a girl like that at Radiant Garden. She travels with two other girls, Rikku and Paine. Not this Riku, a different one. Little blond girl." Yuffie explained.

Auron's eyes widened. "That's her. I know them. They're alive? It's been so long, I thought I was the only one left. I couldn't find anyone in Hades' underworld, and thought they were lost forever."

Riku spoke up, remembering someone from home that he hadn't seen in a few years. "There's another boy on Destiny Islands that I knew growing up named Tidus, too Auron. Spiky blond hair, loves to run around, plays blitzball?"

"Tidus." Auron whispered, a hint of emotion in his voice, the first Riku had heard since he arrived. "He's alive too? I thought I failed him, most of all. But you said he grew up with you?"

"Yeah, him and a bunch of others. Tidus and his friend Wakka would always play blitzball on the island that we played on in summers, where I live now." Riku explained.

"Wakka is there too? But that's not what I meant, you said you grew up with him. He's your age?" Auron asked.

"Yeah, we're the same age." Riku responded, curious why this was important.

"He was nearly twenty when Spira fell, as was Yuna." He turned to Yuffie, asking "Is Yuna Riku's age as well?"

"Um . . . kind of? She's . . .not normal." Yuffie said, slowly.

"Not normal? What happened?"

"She's a fairy. Tiny. She can stand in my hand."

"So it seems they were all changed. I guess that's for the best. Better if they don't remember what happened." Auron turned to Riku then, and Riku saw pain in his eyes. "Will you take me to see them, Riku? I don't need to talk to them; it's for my own peace of mind. I thought I had failed everyone, and that I had lost everything. To know that at least those few live would ease my mind."

Riku couldn't say no, of course. Not when it meant that much, and it wouldn't take long anyways, King Mickey wouldn't be back for days yet. "Sure. Shall we leave after this?"

And after they finished eating, Auron and Riku boarded the _Heart Seeker_ and left for Radiant Garden. As they flew off, Riku realized that Jack had never answered the question, and wondered why the vocal Captain had abstained from that conversation, and made a mental note to ask when they returned.


	17. Part 17: Getting Ready Twice Over

Axel stood in the shower and let the water run down his hair and body, letting the hot water ease his sore muscles. It had been two days since Riku and Auron had left, and Axel had spent the whole time training with the other members of the team. He spent most of the time practicing with a long, thin greatsword, the blade of it as tall as he was, and the handle another 2 feet above that. The sword was enormous, but he had learned quickly from the other how to use it effectively, and was getting better and better. Tarzan had even spent the first evening after seeing him practice with it making a specialized leather harness to keep it strapped to his back with.

Axel only practiced with the chakrams occasionally- he felt like they were part of him, and was better with the chakrams the first time he used them than he was after two days of almost constant practice with the sword. Yuffie was also teaching him some basic control of magic, with he was now beginning to tie together with his other two weapons.

But tonight, he didn't intend to think about practicing anymore and instead wanted to clean up, and see if Yuffie would like to go outside the castle to the countryside for an evening picnic. Axel stayed in the shower for an unnecessarily long amount of time, trying to work up the nerve to ask. "Alright. I can do this, this will be cake compared to the training she puts me through, right?"

Getting out of the shower, drying off, and dressing in his black slacks and yellow dress shirt and black shoes didn't take as long as he would've liked, but he psyched himself up nonetheless and made his way out of his room and started walking towards Yuffie's room. As he left his room he crossed paths with Mulan, who smiled as she saw him all dressed up. "Here, let me help you with that." Mulan said while chuckling, fixing his collar. "What's the occasion?"

"Well, I, ah, um… I was going to ask, uh, Yuffie, to go on a picnic." Axel stammered, taking much longer than comfortable to make it through the sentence. Mulan just smiled and giggled.

"In that case, let me fix a couple more things so you don't look so stiff." She rolled up his sleeves to just below his elbows, folding them neatly, and then unbuttoned the top two buttons of his shirt and positioned the shirt so it was slightly open. "There! Now you look much more dashing. Make sure you stop by the mess hall to grab some food first, it wouldn't be in good form to show up for a picnic without the food, right?" Mulan joked, giving him a quick pat on the back as she continued to her and Shang's room.

"Food! I knew I was forgetting something." Axel rushed off to the kitchens in the mess hall, grabbing a bad and putting in fruits, some sandwiches, a bottle of red wine, a handful of plates, two wineglasses, silverware and napkins. "Good to go!" he said to himself, as he rushed back to Yuffie's room, not wanting to have their picnic in the dark. Stopping in front of her door, he took a moment to compose himself, and then knocked on the door. After a few moments, Yuffie opened and peeked her head around the door, hair wet, wrapped in a towel.

Seeing Axel, she let out a startled "Meep!" and quickly shut the door. "How dare you try to peek in on a lady after her shower!" she accused, raising her voice so he could hear her through the door. Axel could hear her scrambling around on the other side of the door, most likely getting dressed or trying to clean. Or looking for something to hit him with, he felt like all three options were possible when it came to Yuffie.

"I wasn't trying to peek! I just came by to ask you something!"

"Oh yeah? What?" Yuffie answered, finally opening the door again, dressed in her short shorts and tank top.

"Wanna go on a picnic?" Axel blurted, the words out of his mouth before he could think to put them more eloquently.

Yuffie immediately blushed, then closed the door in his face. _I guess that's a no? I knew I shouldn't have asked, I was being foolish._ "Don't laugh!" he heard all of a sudden, with an accompanying flurry of scrambling noise on the other side of the door.

"Bwuh?" was all Axel could think to say, his mind still stuck somewhere between confusion, sadness, and hopefulness. Yuffie opened the door again a few moments later, no longer wearing her shorts and tank top, but instead wearing a cream yellow, knee length summer dress with spaghetti straps that had flowers on the shoulders, and white sandals. "Bwuh?" Was all Axel could get out once again, his mind stuck in confusion of wondering how she changed so quickly, and wonderment with how wonderfully cute she looked in the outfit. He next started laughing, much to Yuffie's chagrin.

"Hey! I said not to laugh! You think this looks silly don't you." She said, looking down at the ground and turning to go back into her room. Axel reached out and caught her arm, and held her still before she could close the door behind her.

"No no no, don't be silly, it's just that I've never seen you wearing anything except your black outfit, and I was surprised. I think you look great, really pretty!" He said, giving the outfit a look over again.

"Eyes up here bub!" Yuffie joked, relieved that Axel liked the outfit, she had been waiting for an occasion to wear it for him. "Let's go!" Axel could only laugh again, happy at the way things turned out.

A quick walk and half an hour later Axel found the spot he picked out under an enormous tree on a hill, where they could watch the sunset. "Here's the spot," he said, laying out the blanket one of the cooks was kind enough to lend him. "Shall we?"

"Yup Yup!" Yuffie replied, jumping and plopping down on the blanket. "Thank you for inviting me, this is nice!" The two picnic goers ate their food, had some wine, all the while chatting along about whatever they were thinking of at the time. Yuffie told stories from her past, Axel teased, Yuffie punched him, and the cycle repeated many times, until the sunset started, and they both watched, content. Sitting next to each other, Yuffie's head resting on his shoulder, Axel was glad he had someone like Yuffie to be around in this strange place that he found himself.

Once the sun finished setting, Axel and Yuffie walked back into the castle, hand in hand, smiling and chatting away. As they got back to the castle though, they found it buzzing with activity. Curious and anxious, the two hurried and jogged back to their common room, to find the other members of their team grabbing bags from their rooms and handing them off to some servants who had stopped by.

Axel spotted Jack coming out of his room, and intercepted him. "Hey, what's going on? Are we going somewhere?"

Jack nodded. "That's right lad. Mickey's sent a transmission, saying that a world called "Arctos" or something is about to come under attack by an army of Heartless. We're to mobilize and lead the counter-attack."

Yuffie stopped him before he could walk off, asking "Counter-attack? Not defense?"

Jack shook his head solemnly. "We're too far away; we don't have the ships to make it in time to defend. Our best hope is to make it during the attack, so that we can reinforce, or if their first castles can't hold them off then we can at least attack them before they can move onto the second set. Hurry and pack, we leave soon. Ol' Kingsy made me commander of our forces here, and I don't intend to waste time. Pack warm, the entire planet is in constant winter, according to our records." Jack finished, and walked off briskly, making sure the rest of the castle was doing what it needed to.

"It's a bit of a surprise to see him taking responsibility, huh?" Axel heard Yuffie ask. He turned to agree with her, and saw that she was wearing her black outfit again, the shorts, tank top, long boots, and headband.

"When did you get a chance to change?"

"Just now. Duh! Let's grab our gear bags!" the gear bags were bags that they had prepped in case of situations like this, where they needed to leave on missions quickly, or just for missions in general. Axel grabbed his two bags from the corner of his room, along with the greatsword and its leather harness and scabbard. By the time he back out in the hangar, he found Yuffie already waiting with her shurikens and gear bags too. "Let's get on Axel!" she said as she ran up the docking ramp.

As Axel went forward, they found the rest of the team on board already, except for Jack, who showed up seconds later. "We're leaving before the army, we need to find out what's going on so we can give orders right when the army arrives. Mickey's already sent a message to Riku and Auron, they're meeting us there, if they don't get there before in that fast ship of his." He grabbed the transmitter on the front of the ship, and set it to send a message to the fleet and the speakers in the hanger. "Let's go lads! We got a planet to save!" He cheered, and the army outside cheered right with him.

Jack turned back to the others in the ship, saying "Well, since I'm in charge of this ship, I get to be _Captain_ Jack Sparrow again, try to remember that, ya?" He laughed, as he plopped his tri-corner hat on his head. He leaped into the captain's seat, and took over the flight controls, and flew the ship out.

Axel turned to Yuffie, who was sitting beside him. "Well, hopefully two days of training was enough, huh?" he laughed.


	18. Part 18: Battle at the Breach

Riku glanced back at Auron, who was staring silently at an information station on the _Heart Seeker_. Auron had become quiet after Riku had taken him to Destiny Islands and Radiant Garden to see the people he missed so much. He worried about if it could have affected his state of mind, and figured he either had to get Auron out of this slump, or make sure it at least didn't affect him. "Auron, will you be all right?"

Auron grunted in response. "Yes. I'm just thinking. All these people I used to protect aren't the same anymore, and don't even remember me. But they are safe now, right? I don't need to be their Guardian anymore. I feel . . . closure. An inner peace." He turned to Riku and said, "Thank you for this gift."

Riku nodded, glad that there wouldn't be an issue. "It's no problem. We'll be at Arctos soon, have you heard of the place?"

"No. There isn't much in this database either. It seems they're reclusive, and it's a harsh place to live. Unless you're one of the native species, and the impression I get is that they're mostly magical, and made almost completely of ice. It should be interesting conditions to fight in. We'll need to dress and equip for the occasion. You brought your katana?"

"Of course. It's in my equipment locker next to my bags." Riku answered. Auron walked to the locker and grabbed the sword, examining the handle and the cross guard, giving a quick grunt of approval. Unsheathing the sword, Auron looked down the blade, examining the edge and curve of the blade.

"Hm. Well made. Did you get this from the castle armory?" Auron asked as he sheathed the blade and placed it back into the locker.

"Yeah. I asked the blacksmith to make me a personal one, and left him some requests for materials and designs that I'd like. But this simple one is sharp, strong, and light, and that is all I need in a weapon for now. We're coming up on the Arctos now, putting up the scans on the monitors." Riku said, his fingers dancing across the control panels around him.

The two looked up at the monitors, each seeing the crystalline, icy blue planet, with snowstorms and blizzards racing around the planet, leaving some areas covered in snow, other areas only ice and stone. Their initial awe faded and expressions darkened as they studied the images though. The planet was most icy mountains, uninhabited and wild. But near the northern pole, there was a massive castle, dwarfing any other structure Riku had ever seen. Its main defense looked to be three enormous rings of icy walls, each one twice as tall as the one before it, with small castles and watch towers spread evenly along the walls of ice. Looking closer, Riku noticed that the walls weren't just icy; they were actually made of ice, with stone used decoratively.

Auron pointed at the southern side of the castle. "Look here. The Heartless Have breached the first wall, and the creatures are filling the outer ring to try to breach the second." He leaned in closer to the screen and read some of the number scrolling across, comparing them to what he was seeing on screen in the videos and images. "There aren't enough defenders on the second wall. It looks like too many of them fell defending the first one. They need to pull back to the inner wall."

Riku nodded in agreement. "Let's try to contact them and see where we can land, and ask if King Mickey is here. Maybe he's on the ground already." Punching in the proper commands, Riku sent a message to try to reach anyone on the surface- the hangars, a command center, anything he could try to get into contact with.

Luckily, some connected and opened transmission right away. "The King told us to be looking for this ship ID. Who is this?" a man made of ice answered. Riku was startled. There we no curves on the face on the screen- Everything about the face he was looking at were straight lines, or an angle, even the obsidian, multifaceted eyes. He recovered quickly though, replying, "My name is Riku, and I serve the King. We're here to assist in any way we can."

The ice man nodded. "We'll need everything we can get." He turned to look at something off screen. "Commander!" And the screen flickered, and a different face appeared, this one startling Riku even more. The top left of the head was missing. The left eye, the top half of the left ear, and everything above those, gone. A human would never be still alive after that. But of course, this world's inhabitants weren't human.

"How many men did you bring?" The commander asked. No introductions it seemed. Riku didn't blame him; his entire planet was under attack.

"There's just me and one other on my ship. We were closer than the army, who should be here soon, along with the rest of our team." Riku responded.

"Only two? Well you better be as good as the King says you are, we're losing ground quickly."

"You don't have enough men to hold the second wall, Commander. You need to fall back to the third wall. It's doesn't have as much ground to hold, so your men can fight together more effectively, instead of fighting alone like they are now. The walls are taller too, making for weaker and more tired heartless by the time they get to the top." Riku explained.

The commander's expression flashed to anger. "We know that. But there are too many Heartless, to turn around and flee now would mean our men would get cut down from behind."

Auron held up a hand to interrupt. "Is the King there?"

"Yes. He and his companion are at the castle gates now, getting ready to go fight at the walls. You're army needs to get here soon if we're going to survive, kid." The Commander replied gruffly.

Riku caught onto Auron's line of thought and finished explaining for him. Riku pointed at the breach where the Heartless were pouring into the first ring. "If you tell the King and his companion to meet us here, the four of us can hold this breach." Auron explained. "It will be hard, but we can do it. While we do that, your men will fight off any Heartless that aren't drawn to us, and then retreat to the final wall, and preparing the defenses there, as well as setting up a way to get our troops that will land from the landing zones and hangars to the walls quickly." Riku finished. Auron nodded in approval.

"The four of you holding the breach? That's a suicide mission. There are too many."

"And they will all want to kill the ones who would dare stand in their way. They will stop attacking your walls and attack us instead. We can buy you the time you need." Riku explained. "We know what it could cost."

The commander stood still silently for a few moments, looking into Riku's eyes. "You mean it don't you? You are a rare kind of person, young man. Very well. We'll send the kind your message. Hopefully he agrees with your plan, or it'll just be you two. May the Frost protect you." And then the transmission ended.

Auron chuckled. "This will be a good fight. Four against thousands? You are bold Riku. Bold indeed."

"Or I'm a fool about to doom himself and a friend." Riku replied, but he could not help laughing as well. "The commander has been courteous enough to send us coordinates for a landing pad. Programming them into the auto-pilot now."

Auron glanced down at Riku. "The auto pilot? You aren't going to- ah. I see. I like this idea." Auron said, once he realized what Riku planned. "Now we're talking." Auron ran back to the rear loading doors, and hit the button to open them, grabbing his sword along the way, as well as Riku's katana. Riku was right behind him, having just finished with the coordinates.

Auron handed Riku the katana, which he strapped onto his lower back, so the sword was behind him at an angle and out of his way, the handle near his right elbow. "Ready to jump?" Riku asked with a smile.

"Right behind you, kid." Auron replied, shrugging off one shoulder of his long coat he always kept half on.

Riku nodded, took a deep breath, and leaped out of the back of the ship, with Auron leaping out right after him. The jump was perfectly timed and executed, and the duo fell towards the center of the breach. As they approached the ground, Riku drew his katana, and surrounded himself and Auron in an aura of shadow energy. This energy softened their fall, and the impact felt as if they only dropped a few feet. But to the Heartless in the breach, the shadow energy had an entirely different effect. As they landed, the energy exploded outwards, utterly destroying the heartless closet to the impact zone, and throwing the farther ones away from them.

Riku and Auron had landed facing opposite directions, Riku facing out of the breach, and Auron into the breach. Wasting no time, Riku began cutting into the Heartless. There were many breeds of Heartless here- soldiers, shadows, neoshadows, and whatever other minions you could imagine. But no matter the breed, they weren't fast enough to keep up with Riku. Riku was a blur who didn't even bother with attempting to block attacks, because he knew that if they swung at him he wouldn't be there to hit. When the Heartless attacked, he simply wasn't there wasn't there anymore, moving so quickly that the Heartless never even saw him, only noticed signs of his passing- and these signs were Heartless suddenly falling, dismembered, or just exploding into wisps of shadow as they were destroyed.

Auron, on the other hand, took a more direct approach. Wading straight into the first line of Heartless in front of him, he swung his massive sword, cutting down any Heartless who stood before him, whether they blocked or not did not matter, Auron cut through them anyways. Whirling about, Auron was visible where Riku wasn't, but that didn't help the Heartless, because if you were in a position to see him, he was in a position to see you, and you didn't last long after that.

It didn't take long for the Heartless army as a whole to take note of their presence, and begin to move towards them. Signs of the battle appeared on the two as well- Both Riku and Auron had multiple cuts spread about their bodies, and they were getting weaker. How long had they been holding? Riku estimated maybe half an hour. A half an hour, with two fighting against thousands. He thought they were doing pretty well. Though, it seemed that maybe The King didn't approve of his plan after all, he thought grimly. There were no more Heartless inside the walls that they could see, so that meant at least all the native soldiers had retreated to hold the inner walls, and that Riku and Auron had bought at least some of the time that they needed.

He backed into Auron, whose shirt and coat had been torn to shreds at this point, and body covered in cuts. "Well, we did pretty well, right?" Auron said as he cut down several more Heartless who leaped at him, and kicking another off to his side.

"I guess. . . we did. . . all right." Riku panted, his tiredness catching up to him. Riku parried a soldier's sword, not having the energy to dodge everything anymore, and then cut off the offending arm, then the head of that arm's owner, turning the Heartless to motes of shadow. "It would've been nice though if Mickey thought our plan was a good one." Riku joked, his mind having accepted that they could die any moment now. That moment could be soon too, as a new wave of Heartless began charging towards them.

As Auron and Riku braced themselves for the charge, the Heartless in the front lines began falling under a sudden barrage of gunfire. A swirling, frayed, torn, red cloak flew past Riku and Auron, floating just above the ground, and from inside the swirling cloak a hail of bullets flew out, cutting down even more Heartless. The cloak whirled back towards Riku and Auron, stopping next to them, which allowed the two to see that the cloak was in fact a man. The man turned his blood red eyes to the two, nodded, and raised a gold gauntleted hand, brushing some of his long black hair out of his face, behind a red headband wrapped around his head. Then he began shooting more Heartless from the tri-barreled gun he had.

Suddenly a wave of warm energy passed through them, and the injuries that Riku and Auron had suffered began to heal, and the exhaustion began to wash out of their bodies. Turning around they were greeted with the sight of King Mickey, who was holding his hand out towards them, casting healing magic. "I'm so sorry it took us so long to get here. There were so many Heartless in the way; we never thought we'd get here in time. I can't believe you held out for this long." King Mickey turned to the man standing next to him, and Riku noticed that it was the commander he had talked to earlier. "I told you they were good men, Commander Boreal."

Commander Boreal smiled his strange smile, saying "That they are, my King. Brave men deserving of assistance!" He drew his diamond shaped shield a longsword from his side, which was made of white ice, and glowed a bright blue.

"You're the commander, shouldn't you be back with your men?" Riku asked as he turned to make ready to defend the breach.

"They know their orders. And I would be a poor Ice Born indeed if I did not at least assist in holding this breach with the off worlders! Let's go comrades! Charge!" and with a great roar, Commander Boreal charged the Heartless line that was also charging them.

Mickey just shrugged. "I'll stand back and render magical assistance where I can from that mound of rubble, to keep you all healed and to get any Heartless when a target presents itself. We only have to hold out for a little while longer- The other Ice Born soldiers are setting up a retreat for us now. We'll be out of here soon."

Riku looked at Auron, and they could only laugh at their luck. They turned to the battle to see the man in the red cloak leaping around from pile of rubble to pile of rubble, shooting at the heartless, and slashing at them with his gauntlet whenever one got too close. Commander Boreal was in the thick of the Heartless, cutting them down with his sword, bashing with his shield.

Riku leaped in beside him, and Auron charged to the Commander's other side. Together they formed the points of a triangle, all pointing outwards, and cutting down Heartless that another point had left vulnerable or blocking for a point when that point couldn't.

And despite all odds, they held their ground.


	19. Part 19: Reinforcements

"We're coming up on Arctos now, Captain!" Shang reported from the viewing station.

"You don't actually have to call Jack 'Captain,' Shang." Mulan laughed.

Jack threw Mulan a hurt look. "Well, he's quite a gentleman for doing so, you could learn something from him." He turned back to the screen located in front of his captain's chair. "Let's open up transmissions with this place, see who is in command."

"On it!" Yuffie yelled from the communications station. Her fingers quickly typed in the commands, she had become quite adept at working the computer during their trip at the communications center. "Transmission established, sending it to you Jack!"

"_Captain _Jack, if you please." Jack automatically responded. Axel just chuckled from his spot, which was standing behind Yuffie in her chair, watching her work and doing what errands she needed done. Or what anyone needed done, since he wasn't familiar with the ship at all.

An image was put onscreen, and it was of a man whose face seemed to be made entirely of ice. Jack was expecting this, though and was unfazed. Axel though, was not. "What is THAT?" Yuffie responded by throwing her elbow back and hitting him in the stomach, doubling Axel over onto the ground to curl up and groan.

Jack turned back to the screen. "Pardon our friend here. We're here on orders from King Mickey, how's the battle going?"

"We're at our last walls now with all our men. Your King and some men are holding a breach to give us time to set up. He left a recorded message for you, I'll play it now." He turned and pressed some buttons, and the image onscreen changed to Mickey, and behind him was a skinny man with black hair, a red headband, and a frayed red cloak.

Yuffie gasped. "Vincent?"

Before anyone could ask her about him, the message started playing, and King Mickey was talking quickly. "Hey guys, glad to see you're here. Riku and Auron are holding a breach in the walls now as I speak, so I need to make this fast. When you get here, defending this castle is your first priority. If the defenses are set, I'll leave you all to decide what decisions should be made on how to proceed. I'm taking Vincent to help hold the breach, and-"

A voice from off screen interrupted Mickey- "I'm coming too!"

Mickey nodded, "Of course commander." He turned back to the screen. "Hurry though. I don't know how long we can hold the breach. Riku and Auron have already been on their own too long." The screen went blank, and END OF MESSAGE appeared for a second before the ice officer appeared back on screen.

"Our defenses are set, they've bought us the time we needed to get our final wall ready. We're about to go get the King and his men back in our walls. What's the plan?" The officer asked.

Shang said "We could take our army and reinforce the walls even further, making sure that the walls won't fall."

Jack waved his hand in dismissal. "Not our whole army. If we put too many men on the wall, we won't have enough room to swing a weapon against the Heartless. Send one transport ship to fill in the gaps on the wall left by anyone who falls. Send a crew of engineers as well, to help the Ice Born engineers make sure the wall won't be breached like the first." He turned and put a wicked smile on his face. "The rest of us are going to land behind the Heartless. We'll crush them against the Ice Born defenses."

"Captain!" one of the navigation officers yelled. "Heartless ships coming up from around the mountains on intercept course with our fleet!"

"Bloody hell. That's awfully rude of them. Same plan though! Except now I'm taking all our fighters and capital ships to keep that fleet off your backs. A ship is where I belong, after all. Go go go! Get on the dropships! Shang, Mulan! You have experience with commanding armies, you're in charge of our forces on the ground." Then he turned back to watch the radar screen and the approaching ships. "I'll take care of these buggers."

During all this, Axel and Yuffie were handing their station over to other officers, and they ran to the dropship and buckled into their seats. "You ready for this, Yuffie?" Axel asked, nervous.

"Heck yeah! I've been in worse odds before." Yuffie replied, cheerful as usual. "You?"

Axel nodded, forcing a smile on his face. "Well, yeah. I've only been in one fight with Heartless, and I almost died." He laughed.

"Oh, you'll be fine. Stop thinking so much!" Yuffie laughed.

Beast ducked into the dropship, with Tarzan right behind him. "I'm not sure that's the best advice, Yuffie." Beast said in his rumbling voice, buckling in opposite Axel, and Tarzan next to him.

"Bah you know what I mean." Yuffie said, as Shang and Mulan got on the ship and buckled in.

"I thought you guys were going with the army?" Axel asked.

"We need to get down there quickly, so while you guys are flying to the battlefield we'll parachute out the back and land on some high ground so we can see and give orders." Mulan explained. "Only the ship heading to reinforce the wall has left, and everyone else is still loading onto transports. This will be the quickest ship out for us."

"Ah. Got it." Axel said. Seeing that everyone was buckled in, he turned to the pilot and tapped him on the shoulder. "Everyone's set, let's hit it!"

"Copy that, bay doors opening. Taking off now. Enjoy the ride fellas." The pilot said as the flew out of the ship. "We'll be over your drop zone in just a few minutes, Commanders."

"Thanks." Mulan and Shang replied, and then they began looking at maps to discuss deployments.

Axel was looking out the window when he saw movement at the giant breach in the first wall. "Guys, check it out! It's The king and the others!" He said as he pointed. Everyone gathered to look out of the small windows. "That is a HUGE gap, they've been holding that for an hour? Damn they're good." Axel commented.

"Look, it's their retreat!" Yuffie said. Two dozen snowmobiles were racing towards the breach, the lead vehicle firing a bright green flare over the breach. King Mickey looked up and saw it, and started shouting orders to fall back. The figures at the front of the breach started running back, just as every one of the snowmobiles launched a ball made of glowing ice, each one about a meter in diameter.

The balls soared over the heads of the retreating figures, and landed in the breach, where they exploded, freezing all of the Heartless that attempted to follow in place, creating a makeshift wall that the Heartless behind had to begin breaking through. But by the time they broke through their former fellows, they snowmobiles were already racing back towards the central castle, with the King and the others riding behind the drivers.

"Yahoo!" Yuffie cheered. "They're safe!"

As she said this, the back door to the drop ship slid open, and she turned to see Mulan and Shang standing at it, with deployable gliders strapped to their backs. "This is our stop. See you guys after the battle!" Mulan said, right before they ran and jumped, deploying their gliders and flying towards the high cliff overlooking the area that would become the battle field.

Axel turned to the others as the door closed, asking "So, where are we landing? Did Jack say?"

"Command hangar. Meeting the King." Tarzan replied as he inspected the dark leather armor he was wearing, tightening and loosening straps so he would have maximum mobility. Tarzan was proven correct moments later, as they landed in the hangar and ran down the loading ramp to see the ones who had been defending the breach.

Before anyone could say anything, Yuffie had dashed to the man in the red cloak and embraced him. "Vincent! We all thought you were dead! Where have you been?" She asked, squeezing hard. Axel felt a flash of jealousy jolt through him as he saw this, but let it pass, waiting to hear the whole story eventually.

"Yuffie. Not so hard. I'm injured." He replied in his deep, resonating voice as he cringed from the pain.

Yuffie let go immediately with a yelp, saying "Sorry!" and inspecting the cut across his chest he received during the fighting at the breach.

"We can talk later. Right now we have business to take care of." He said as he gently pushed Yuffie back.

Axel was looking at the others though, and was shocked at their condition. Riku's shirt was completely shredded, the only indication he even had one on beforehand was the tattered rags that were still tucked into his pants, which were also missing the bottom half of the right leg sleeve, which also looked like it was torn off. More shocking was his wounds- despite his speed and King Mickey's healing magic, he was still covered in blood, and had open wounds across his back, along with three deep gashes across his front from the claw of some Heartless.

Auron wasn't in much better condition. He still had his shirt, but his coat was ripped apart as well, and only the bottom half remained, held up by his thick belt. All of which also had blood all over them. It looked like Auron didn't feel his wounds though, only the exhaustion from fighting so many Heartless.

The Ice Born that was fighting with them didn't appear to have any blood dripping from him, but there were chunks of ice missing from parts of his chest, arms, and legs. Along with a large portion of his head, but for some reason Axel thought that the head wound wasn't from the battle at the breach, because it didn't look quite so . . . fresh. He wasn't sure how he got that impression, but he did.

Mickey looked untouched, but appeared exhausted. He must've used up all his energy on magic, trying to keep the others alive.

Axel turned to the troop transport that had landed in the hangar, and yelled for some healers, who hustled over and began casting the spells needed to tend to Riku and the others. Riku nodded in thanks to Axel and the healers.

"That was quite the fight! It was an honor to fight alongside you all." The Ice Born said to King Mickey and the others, his obsidian eyes shining, thumping his shield for emphasis.

"You as well, Commander Boreal." Auron replied. "You fight well."

"Many thanks. I'm going to go take charge of the defense, and to rally my men. The arrival of your army will be a great boost to our morale, but my men on the wall will still need a Commander to look to. Farewell, and may the Frost protect you this day!" Commander Boreal saluted, and then ran off to the battlements.

"What is this 'Frost' he mentioned?" Axel asked. "Their deity?"

"Not quite. It's the life energy that the planet generates; it's what gives the Ice Born life. They aren't typical living organisms like us." The King explained. "But that's for later. We need to be ready to fight again by tonight. The battle has only just begun." He looked around. "Where are the others? Jack, Mulan, and Shang?"

Axel provided a quick summary of what was happening outside. "Mulan and Shang are commanding the ground forces that are landing behind the Heartless army; they've taken some high ground to get a better view. Before we landed there was a fleet of Heartless ships coming from around the other side of the mountain range to attack us here, so Jack took our fleet and went to fight them off."

"A fleet from the other side of the mountains? That must be where they are staged. The Commander has been trying to find them; we never thought they would stay in the storms there. King Mickey sighed. "Well I hope the others are all right. We have much to prepare for. We aren't here to fight on the front lines, we're here to find the leaders commanding the Heartless from this camp, gather what information we can, and get rid of the leaders." He turned to those who fought at the breach with him, saying "Grab a couple hours of rest and prepare to leave as the sun sets. We need to do this as soon as we can. For you who just got here, study the maps in the War Room and learn what you can about the area where we're going. We leave in 2 hours."


	20. Part 20: It's a Part Of You

Riku, Auron, King Mickey, and the man in red that Yuffie had named "Vincent" left to go clean themselves up, and since Riku and Auron's bags were on their ship that had flew in safely after their jump into the breach, that's where they all decided to go, talking amongst themselves along the way.

"My name is Riku, from Destiny Islands." Riku said as he extended his hand to Vincent. "You're a really good fighter, thank you for helping, you definitely saved us out there."

Vincent looked down at Riku's hand, staring at it for a few moments before deciding to shake it. "It's no problem. I'm Vincent Valentine, from Gaia. You fight well too." He said, with a slight nod at Riku to acknowledge his fighting skill.

"Thank you. Gaia? I haven't heard of that world, is it far from here?" Riku asked.

"As far as can be. It no longer exists. It was destroyed years ago." Vincent answered. He turned to Auron. "Much like Spira was. I too know the taste of failure."

Auron was slightly taken aback, but the only sign was that his eyes widened slightly. "Your world too? But you escaped, it seems."

Vincent nodded. "I'm difficult to kill. We managed to get many off of our world before it fell though. The Planet saw to that. It fought while we escaped, and then fell, trying to protect itself."

Riku was shocked. "Your _planet_ fought back?"

"Yes. The Planet used its energy to destroy great numbers of Heartless that attacked, allowing us time to escape." Vincent explained.

"Wow. That is an impressive world, I'm sad that it was lost. How long were you all here before we arrived?" Riku asked the King and Vincent.

"I have only been here for a few days." The King explained. "Searching for Vincent. Which is how I managed to send out a message to you so quickly, I was here before the Heartless and saw them coming."

"And I have been here for . . . many years. I'm not sure how long. I have been sleeping, and thinking." Vincent replied.

During their conversation they had arrived at their ship, and were in the process of cleaning off and preparing for the raid later. Riku found a put on a form fitting, black, long sleeved shirt that he hoped would disguise him well in the night. Auron had simply changed into another set of the same outfit he seemed to always wear. Riku wondered where he kept so many large coats and boots. Vincent put on a new leather suit, but left his same red cloak on, not bothering to fix the tears or cuts, just cleaning the blood out of it. King Mickey was in front of a mirror, washing off the dirt and muck off himself. After they finished, Auron started walking back to the crew quarters.

"Auron, where are you going?" Riku asked.

"To get some sleep. A warrior needs rest to keep fighting like this." Auron explained before entering the lift.

"Oh. You know, that seems like good advice. I guess I should sit down and rest a little too." Riku conceded. He sat on a box near the rear loading bay of the ship, content to just watch the workers doing their jobs as he rested, waiting for the raid.

Vincent walked over, having finished fixing up his armor and cleaning his gun. "You are an interesting man, Riku." Vincent said, sitting next to Riku.

"How so?" Riku asked, still watching the workers go about their business.

"You have a darkness within you." Vincent explained bluntly.

Riku immediately became cautious and wary of Vincent, not sure about how Vincent knew about this. "What do you mean by that?" Riku asked, trying to keep his voice level and nonchalant.

"You know what I am talking about. You have darkness inside that you can control. But you fear it, and though we almost died many times over, you did not unleash it at the breach. That is what interests me." Vincent replied.

"How did you know? Did the King mention it?" Riku asked, still on edge.

"No, of course not. I can . . . feel . . . it. Sense it." Vincent said. "Your inner demons keep you from using your full power."

"You can sense it?" Riku asked, confused. Not even Heartless of the Organization could sense his darkness before, how come this man could?

"Yes. You should not let your past sins affect your decisions now, Riku. Your demons are _yours_ and you can do what you want with them. Your darkness is not something to be ashamed or afraid of. It is part of you, part of your very being. You must bend your darkness and demons to your control, and then your darkness will do what you wish, just as your swords do." Vincent continued.

"And how would you know something like this?" Riku replied; interested in the advice and where Vincent could learn such an idea.

"We all have our inner demons, Riku." As he said this, his eyes flashed a glowing yellow, startling Riku. The eyes he saw were the bright red he was looking at now, which gave off a feeling of calm and cool. The eyes he saw gave off a primal feeling, hinting at power within. "You just have to learn how to control them."

"I understand. Thank you, Vincent."Riku said as he shook Vincent's hand, who did not stop to inspect Riku's hand this time.

"I must go to Yuffie. She will have many questions. Let us talk again, later." Vincent said, not waiting for a reply before walking off into the complex.

"You are quite interesting yourself, Vincent Valentine." Riku said to himself, thinking about what the mysterious Red-cloaked man had told him. Riku brought up his hand, and willed into existence a ball of dark fire that floated above his palm. "Master my darkness, huh?" He summoned two more, and watched as he made the three glowing balls of dark fire dance in circles around him. "Not a bad idea."


	21. Part 21: The War Room

Though it had only been half an hour, Axel decided he'd had enough of looking at these maps. Too many lines, too many dots, and too many words he couldn't pronounce. "This is complete gibberish." He muttered to himself.

"Why don't you just use this one instead? I like it a lot better than those silly lines." Yuffie commented from the table behind him. Axel turned to look at hers, already prepping himself for disappointment. Instead of paper though, he say a floating holographic image spinning slowly above the table.

"Whoa. Why didn't you tell me you were looking at this earlier?" He asked, feeling slightly annoyed he had spent all that time trying to decipher the Ice Born maps he'd been handed.

"I did, you were too busy looking at those silly paper things. Geez." Yuffie said in her matter-of-fact tone of voice that he was beginning to get to know well. Axel merely grunted his displeasure before joining Yuffie and Tarzan at the floating, table-top map. The map shows the general layout of the terrain in three dimensions, with markers indicating where King Mickey had estimated the Heartless base of operations to be, as well as some figures floating above the ground indicating where Jack and his fleet were fighting the Heartless ships. Larger markers with symbols on them were also showing the positions of the armies on the ground- there were a few of the strange black hearts that the Heartless have embedded on their chest indicating where the main concentration of the Heartless forces outside the walls were.

"It looks like the Heartless attacking the second wall are taking some pretty serious damage," Axel commented, adding "and Shang and Mulan's forces are coming up soon to crush them on the walls." Everyone in the room knew that meant soon the Heartless at the walls would be dealt with by soldiers on the walls as they tried to climb, or by the soldiers approaching from behind. "I guess Jack's plan is going to work after all, eh?"

"Unless they have another method to break the wall like they did the first one." Beast responded.

"Oh Beast, don't be such a downer. It'll be fine!" said Yuffie cheerfully, leaping up onto Beast's shoulders, using his height to give her a better view of the holographic field. Beast merely glanced up at her, only slightly annoyed. Her weight was negligible, but his pride briefly considered shaking her off before deciding to ignore it for now. He was becoming too used to Yuffie, he thought. Axel just chuckled at the sight.

Axel pointed at a small pass on the east side of the mountain. "This is quite close to our position. We could probably take it most of the way through the mountains and towards their camp if we're quick, and in the night all these trees will keep us hidden from any ships they have flying above, or any sentries they may have. How's that sound?"

Tarzan grunted in agreement. "Yes. The trees will be good." He said as he flexed his fingers, anticipating being back in some trees again, back in his element.

"That sounds good Axel, we'll take some snowmobiles out tonight to the pass." Mickey said, walking into the room with Vincent following him in a few seconds later. "Everyone meet in the hangar again in an hour, then once we're all gathered we'll start the operation. Jack has been relaying us information while he's been flying, and it does look like the camp is where I thought. Jack, Shang, and Mulan won't be coming with us, they'll be busy fighting off any further Heartless attacks and leading the effort with Commander Boreal. It'll be just us." He finished saying as he walked out to the Command screen to look at the progress of the battle going on outside the walls.

"Us against an entire base? Sounds like fun." Beast said. Axel thought he said it a bit too happily, it almost sounded like a really loud, really deep growl of contentment.

"I don't wanna fight so many guys again, bah." Axel complained quietly.

He felt a hand plop down on his shoulder. "You'll do fine kid. Yuffie will take care of you." He turned to see Vincent standing at his shoulder, and he gave a squeeze of reassurance.

"Yup Yup! No worries Axel!" Yuffie agreed, before turning back to Vincent. "Can I give you a hug now that you're all patched up?" Yuffie asked. Axel could swear she was almost jumping up and down in anticipation.

Vincent just sighed. "Sure." He said, but before he even finished that one word he was nearly knocked off his feet as Yuffie flew into him, arms and legs outstretched , wrapping around him with her entire body, squealing in happiness.

"That is one intense hug." Axel commented, giving a chuckle while surpressing another flash of jealousy.

"Well it needed to be done!" Yuffie replied indignantly. "We all thought he was dead after all." She turned back to Vincent, asking "What happened to you? We thought we lost you on Gaia. We've all been so sad and worried! Even Cloud said he missed you! And don't even get me started on Shelke." Her eyes widened. "Shelke! We have to tell her! She's on Radiant Garden, she's part of King Mickey's research team."

At hearing the name Shelke, Axel noticed a flicker of emotion behind Vincent's eyes, but he couldn't tell what it was. But the fact that he saw something must've meant Shelke was important to him, because it was the first thing in Vincent's eyes that wasn't pain or a sort of cool and calm focus. "How is she?" He simply asked, betraying nothing to anyone who missed that moment.

"She's doing okay, I guess." Yuffie said. "She works hard. She's easily one of the most brilliant researchers there. I think she's working so hard so she can find you, Vincent." She added, a hint of sadness. "You should at least tell her you're okay, if no one else, you know?"

"I will. After this mission. I promise." Vincent responded.

"Why not now? We have time!" Yuffie asked.

"What if I don't make it back from this mission? Then all I'll have done is hurt her even more."

"Don't talk like that! We'll be fine!" Yuffie said tearfully.

"I know. I'm just being careful. I promised I'd talk to her after, right? When we go back to Radiant Garden, I'll go see her." He assured Yuffie.

"You better!" she yelled, jabbing a finger at his chest.

"Yuffie, calm down, he'll do it, all right?" Axel said, grabbing her gently by her shoulders and pulling her back a short ways from Vincent, before she started hitting him.

Vincent looked down at Axel's hands on Yuffie's shoulders, and noted how at ease and comfortable they were there. He grinned, saying "Yuffie, where are your manners? You didn't tell me he was your boyfriend. You should introduce us properly." His voice, always so serious, now held a hint of playfulness.

Yuffie blushed, turning bright red. "H-hey! Not! I mean, not my boyfriend! He isn't!" she turned to Axel, saying "Axel! I mean, like, I, you- uh. " she flustered, turning an even brighter shade of red, which Axel had not thought possible.

Vincent and Axel both laughed, but Axel in his mind Axel had already moved on and was considering what it would be like if he finally asked her to be his girlfriend.

"No?" Vincent asked, looking between the two. "Allow me to borrow your friend here then for a moment, Yuffie." Vincent said as he put an arm around Axel's shoulders and pulled him away from a still stuttering Yuffie, walking him out of earshot. "So how do you feel about Yuffie, Axel? It's far too obvious you two care for each other, why not date? Unless she just didn't want to admit it to me."

"Is there a reason she wouldn't want to tell you?" Axel asked, getting defensive. Axel Was worried that Vincent might be a former boyfriend of Yuffie's, and his jealousy from her showing such affection to him was beginning to come to a head.

Vincent just gave a quiet chuckle and waved his hands to calm down Axel. "No, no reason. Only that she's never been very good at saying such emotional things to people so openly, but I'm sure you know that. You two should be happy. And it would be nice to see her be happy and smile like she used to, it's brought back old memories of the adventures that I accompanied her and her friends on after they found me. And plus, you want it too." He finished with a laugh, walking away to give Yuffie a pat on the shoulder before going to introduce himself to Tarzan and Beast.

Axel, after finally learning that Vincent wasn't an old flame of Yuffie's, felt a renewed burst of boldness come over him, and grabbed Yuffie's arm. "Yuffie, go out with me?" he blurted out.

Yuffie stood there, mouth opening and closing silently, trying to find the words to say, before giving up and nodding, a big grin on her face. She jumped up and wrapped her arms around his neck, holding tightly, and finally got around to saying "yes!" before letting go and jumping and spinning excitedly. Axel couldn't help but just smile at how happy she was, and how happy he was too.


	22. Part 22: Mission Start

Riku was pacing back and forth in the vehicle hangar, waiting with King Mickey for the rest of the team to assemble. Mickey had already given him a brief summary of the plan. They were going to take snowmobiles to the pass at the base of the mountain, then use the cover of the forest encircling its base to get close to the base camp that Mickey suspects contains the leaders of the heartless assembled here. "We take out the leaders, and the heartless army will lose its coordination and begin to leave to look for more leadership." Mickey had said. "It will buy time for us, but more importantly we can also try to follow some of the stragglers or smaller groups through the corridors of darkness to find out where their leaders are, and we can get more information on who and what we're up against." It made sense to Riku, so he just nodded and kept pacing, thinking about the mission to come.

He gave up pacing after a few minutes and just sat cross legged on the same box he sat on earlier while talking to Vincent earlier, and closed his eyes and meditated on his powers, and tried to channel them while waiting.

"Whoa Riku, that's pretty crazy there. Tone it down a bit before you scare everyone, will ya?" said a voice from ahead of Riku. He opened his eyes to see Axel just entering the hangar with Yuffie at his side holding his arm, with Vincent, Beast, and Tarzan not far behind. "How you doing that anyways? That's pretty nifty." Axel finished.

Riku looked down and around to see what axel was referring to, and was surprised to see tendrils of darkness and smoke swirling around himself, making strange yet alluring patterns one moment before coming apart and going back to twirling around Riku. Not realizing he had actually materialized his power, it took Riku a moment to figure out that he had to recall his power, and that it wouldn't fade on its own. With a thought, the swirling darkness dissipated and faded away. "Sorry about that, I didn't realize you were here."

"No problem, you gotta teach me how to do that sometime." Axel said jokingly, giving him a light punch on the shoulder and he sat next to him.

"Get a better hold on your fire first and we'll talk." Riku shot back with a quick grin.

"Ouch. Burn." Axel laughed in mock defeat as Yuffie sat on the floor in front of Axel, leaning back onto Axel's legs for support. Axel put a hand on her head and ruffled her hair playfully, looking down at her contentedly.

One of Riku's eyebrow's rose in slight surprise. _I guess Axel finally asked her out. Took them long enough. _Riku's head tilted in thought, as he was concerned that their behavior and newfound connection could affect the mission.

Vincent came over to stand next to Riku, arms and legs crossed as he leaned against the hull of the ship. "It'll be fine." He said quietly, just loud enough for Riku to hear. "It will make them stronger." Riku nodded, glad that Vincent had already given thought to the situation, as he turned his head back to listen to Mickey's detailed version of the mission briefing. He already knew the details, so he only paid partial attention to what King Mickey was saying as he thought about Sora and Kairi, and wondered what they would think about his developing powers.

He couldn't think too long though, as King Mickey had kept the brief simple and was ready to move out. Riku turned away from the group and mounted the snowmobile that had been given to him, and familiarized himself with the controls. "Looks easy enough." He concluded after a quick inspection.

"Good, you can drive then me too then!" King Mickey said, jumping onto the back of Riku's seat.

"You going to sit, or stand?"

"I'll stand. Better view and a better place to react from if we get attacked. I'm not as tall as the rest of you, ya know." Mickey said, putting a hand on Riku's shoulder for stability.

Riku chuckled. "Got it." He looked around, and saw that Vincent, Beast, and Tarzan had a snowmobile all to themselves, while Yuffie and Axel were sharing one was as well. Though Riku was surprised to see Yuffie in the driver's seat, with Axel sitting behind her, looking sheepish. He saw Riku looking at him, and just shrugged and mouthed "she wanted to drive" with a helpless look on his face.

Mickey just laughed, and turned to everyone and ordered "Let's go!" Riku gunned the throttle, everyone else following close behind. King Mickey grumbled a complaint about long hair under his breath (which Riku heard) as Riku's long, silver hair was flying behind him, buffeting King Mickey's head. Riku just laughed at the sight, a laugh which made him realize that even though they were embarking on a dangerous mission, he was having fun, and was looking forward to the adventure and excitement.

It had been nearly two hours since they left the hangar before they reached the base of the mountain, and the pass there were going to use to sneak around. Leaving the snowmobiles hidden in a copse of trees, they trekked onward through the snow until night had almost fallen.

"Are we going to make camp soon, or are we waiting until it gets dark?" Axel asked.

King Mickey looked up at the distant sun. "Let's make camp now, while we still have light to see by. Tarzan, scout a perimeter and make sure we're alone, could you?" Mickey asked. Tarzan nodded and then disappeared up a tree, jumping, swinging and sliding through the trees, quickly fading away into the distance. Everyone began setting up their tents, and Beast pulled double duty to set up Tarzan's as well while Axel provided a flame to heat up their food before it got dark enough to notice a fire from far away in the dark.

Tarzan returned soon enough, and confirmed that the area was clear, except that there were some large footprints throughout the forest. "The native wildlife." King Mickey explained. "This planet doesn't have small animals; all the wildlife on the planet is quite large. They'll leave us alone, we're too unfamiliar for them to want to investigate. Let's get some sleep, we'll leave before sunrise tomorrow."

"I'll take first watch." Riku volunteered. Vincent offered second watch, and Mickey said he'd take third. With watches settled, everyone went to their tents to sleep as Riku leaped up into a high tree to get a better vantage point of the surrounding area.

It had only been an hour when Riku heard a commotion in the distance, outside the perimeter, but only just. The lack of a source of light wasn't an issue for Riku now, he could see in the dark just as well as in the light now, if not better. "What's making that noise?" Riku whispered to himself. He began leaping from tree to tree, quietly getting closer to the noise. As he got closer, he realized that it sounded like growling and snarling. Wild animals on a hunt, maybe? Then he saw it. A lone wolf, but not just a wolf. It was huge. It's shoulder was higher off the ground than Riku's head, with shining white fur and glowing blue eyes, and teeth as long as Riku's fingers.

As impressive as that was, Riku was alarmed because the commotion was caused by Heartless attacking the wolf. Neoshadows, shadows, and soldiers surrounded and leaped at the wolf, latching onto it's back and slashing it before it could shake them off. The Heartless didn't get away unscathed though, with many getting caught in the wolf's jaws and getting crushed between its enormous teeth. There were a lot of Heartless though, and the attacks were taking their toll on it, Riku could tell it was getting weaker, slower. "This could be a terrible idea, but oh well." Riku grumbled as he leaped down, drawing his katana and summoning his keyblade as he fell upon the Heartless, cutting into them from behind.


End file.
